


Sea Change

by blackkat



Series: Haven [1]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Action/Adventure, Alternate Universe - Merpeople, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Supernatural Elements, BAMF Haruno Sakura, Eventual Romance, F/F, Friendship, Haven Fusion, Humor, M/M, MerMay, Mystery
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-05-30
Updated: 2018-10-10
Packaged: 2018-11-06 16:13:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 10
Words: 42,847
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11039715
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blackkat/pseuds/blackkat
Summary: There are monsters in the water, body parts washing up on the beach, and far too many secrets even for a small town. Sakura was expecting her new post in Konoha to be dull and good for a break, but she hasn't been this wrong in a very long time. Konoha isn't anywhere close to a normal town, but thankfully Sakura isn't all that much like a normal sheriff, either.





	1. full fathom five

**Author's Note:**

> This was supposed to be a brief one-shot for MerMay, but. Uh. It find of exploded into a massive thing that still isn't finished? So I've decided I'll post at least the first chapter before May is over and pretend I'm on time. :D

Really, Sakura thinks wryly, passing the kitschy-cute welcome sign as she pulls into the town, if you’ve seen one quaint northeastern fishing village, you’ve seen them all.

Konoha doesn’t even have the dubious distinction of being a tourist destination. A few of the shops are very clearly meant to appeal to weekenders, and the streets are meticulously clean, but none of the cars Sakura can see have out-of-state plates, and the entire town has the grey and weathered look of old driftwood, worn down by the constant beating of the ocean.

Besides, judging by how many times Sakura got lost trying to find this place, it’s probably not popping up on a lot of GPS routes.

The thought makes Sakura grimace, rubbing at the vague stiffness in her neck. Sleeping in her jeep had seemed like the best option at two in the morning with no idea where she was going, but she’s regretting it a little now. It’s not as if she had anywhere to report in, though, or even anyone expecting her arrival—her predecessor quit over three months ago, and the mayor is apparently on vacation. The sheriff’s office is standing empty, and Sakura had decided it could stay that way for one more night.

It can stay that way for another hour, too, as far as Sakura is concerned. She needs coffee more than she needs oxygen right now, and there's a diner off the sleepy main road that’s well-lit and inviting. There's even a parking spot open right in front of the building, and she pulls in with relief, more than ready for the road trip part of her transfer to be over.

The sign in the window just says “Ino's” in loopy black letters with a spray of violets underneath, and Sakura smiles a little despite herself as she slides out onto the pavement. She’s always liked violets.

There's a chill in the air, predictable but aggravating, and she snags her jacket before slamming the jeep’s door. A quick glance up and down the street shows only a handful of other people, even though it’s midmorning, and there's a long pause between cars passing. It takes effort not to frown, because Sakura read up on all of the statistics before she got here; Konoha's population isn’t _that_ small, even if they do have to get their sheriff by transfer rather than election.

There are, at least, a few other souls in the diner when she pushes in, an older couple in a booth at the back, a brown-haired man with a scar across his nose grading a stack of papers by the window, and a trio of people about her age—a man bundled up in a jacket and sunglasses, a scruffy-looking man with dog hair all over his shirt, and a startlingly lovely woman—talking softly over their breakfasts.

“Good morning!” a cheerful voice calls, and another woman emerges from the kitchen area behind the long bar, smoothing down her ruffled white apron. Sakura takes one look at her and has to catch herself before she walks into the counter, because she doesn’t exactly have a type, but that wealth of butter-blonde hair, those blue eyes, and those generous curves are _definitely_ appealing.

“Good morning,” she returns, and counts it as a success that she doesn’t stutter. “I can sit anywhere?”

The woman laughs, and she’s pretty when she’s distracted but she’s devastatingly gorgeous when she smiles. _Especially_ when she leans forward over the edge of the counter to smile right at Sakura. “Of course. I think we might be able to squeeze you in somewhere.” There's a teasing light in her eyes, and it makes Sakura smile back, despite the long night, the longer morning, and the crick in her neck.

“I appreciate the sacrifice,” she says dryly, and rather than retreat to a booth takes a seat at one of the stools in front of the counter.

Another laugh from the bubbly blonde, who turns away to pick up a mug, coaster, and pot of coffee from the station behind her. “Coffee? You look like you need it.”

Sakura rolls her eyes. “You're a real charmer,” she retorts. “Are you this nice to everyone, or just me?”

The blonde grins, mischief in the curve of her red lips, and offers a wink. “Oh, just the cute ones,” she says cheerfully, and fills the mug with a flourish. “Sugar and cream?”

“Black’s fine.” At the risk of proving the woman right, Sakura picks the cup up immediately, not bothering to let it cool before she takes a long swallow. She loses a layer of skin off her mouth, but the feel of caffeine hitting her bloodstream more than makes up for it, and it’s just slightly possible she makes an indecent noise.

“That good?” the woman asks, amused, as she slides a menu in front of Sakura.

“Strong,” Sakura says thankfully, and smiles when her cup is immediately topped off. The blonde winks again, then heads for the other occupants with the carafe, offering a cheerful greeting as she reaches the trio.

It takes effort not to stare at the sway of her hips in the short skirt she’s wearing, but Sakura is an adult and a respectable member of society, so she _doesn’t_ turn to watch the woman walk away, no matter how tempting it is. Instead, she flips the menu open, glancing over the choices. Lots of crab and fish, as is probably to be expected, and Sakura debates between an omelet and waffles as she finishes her coffee.

There's a sudden clatter that makes Sakura jump, and she glances up to find the waitress starting another pot of coffee. As soon as she’s done, she turns to Sakura, dusting her hands off. “Know what you’d like?” she asks, and it’s _almost_ coy. Sakura is generally pretty good with body language, but she honestly can't peg whether the woman means it or if she’s just flirtatious in general.

Deciding that, either way, it’s _way_ too early to deal with this, Sakura decides to ignore it for the moment, closing her menu. “The waffles with strawberries, please.”

“Good choice, they’re Choji’s specialty.” Her smile is pleased as she jots down the order on her pad, then asks, “Whipped cream?”

“Well, if you're going to twist my arm.” Sakura can't fight a smile when the woman laughs again, and she lets her eyes follow the sway of that long ponytail as the woman disappears back into the kitchen. A moment later she emerges again, casting a glance over her other tables before coming back to lean on the bar next to Sakura.

“You're not from around here,” she says lightly, and blue eyes are bright with curiosity. “Just passing through?”

“Just settling in, actually,” Sakura corrects, and when the woman blinks, she smiles and adds, “Sakura Haruno, the new sheriff. I just got in.”

Something like relief flickers over the blonde’s face, but it’s gone too quickly for Sakura to identify a cause. “I wondered if everything was all right when you didn’t show up last night. I'm glad you're okay.” At Sakura's startled glance, the woman grins and offers a hand. “Ino Yamanaka. I own the diner, but I also run the cabins on the cliff. The mayor has one set aside for the sheriff.”

Her hand is soft in Sakura's, but her grip is firm. “It’s nice to meet you,” Sakura says, and that’s something of an understatement. “Sorry about the no-show—I got lost a couple of times and figured it was better to wait for daylight to try again. I didn’t realize anyone was waiting on me.”

Ino waves that off with a flick of one hand. “Not a problem. I live nearby anyway. It’s good you made it, though.” The chime of a bell makes her pull away, and she ducks back into the kitchen.

Well, Sakura thinks with some relief, she hasn’t put her foot in her mouth yet, which is a good sign. In one of the mirrors hanging behind the bar, she glances over the other customers, assessing. Most of them are as weather-worn as the town, and while Sakura could put some of them down as suspicious—the guy in the zipped-up parka and sunglasses, for instance—she’s more inclined to write them off as quirky personalities. Konoha looks clean and neat, with no graffiti or junky buildings, and though it probably has those too somewhere off the main street, it’s definitely not as bad as a bigger town might be.

“Here you go!” Ino says cheerfully, and a large plate clunks onto the counter in front of Sakura. The smell of strawberries hits her like a punch, way too vivid to be anything but fresh even though it’s only early spring, and her mouth immediately starts watering.

“This looks _amazing_ ,” she says, only just now realizing that’s she’s starving. The granola bar she had for dinner was a long time ago.

Ino chuckles, crossing her arms on the counter. “Choji knows his way around a kitchen,” she says. “When you’re done here, I can show you to the station if you want. It’s just down the block, by the entrance to the harbor.”

Sakura swallows a mouthful that’s probably a little too large for politeness, but manages not to choke. “That’s fine, I can find it if it’s that close. You're busy here.”

“Swamped,” Ino agrees dryly, casting a pointed glance around the quiet diner, though she doesn’t push. “So what did you do to get shoved all the way out into the ass-end of nowhere?”

Sakura snorts, unearthing another pile of strawberries from under a cloud of whipped cream. “Let me guess, your dreams are too big for this small town, and as soon as you get the chance to shine you're going to become a star in the big city?”

That makes Ino laugh, bright and warm. “Hardly,” she says, grinning. “I love this town and I wouldn’t leave if you paid me. But we’re not exactly the most happening place unless you _really_ like fish.”

Not a cliché small-town story, then, even though Ino looks like she should be the type, Sakura thinks, laughing a little herself. That’s nice to find. “I just needed a change,” she says, and it’s almost the complete truth. “I put in a request in for a transfer and my boss gave me this. I was surprised—I’d never heard of a town that doesn’t elect their sheriff.”

Ino tips one shoulder in a shrug, though her smile doesn’t reach her eyes quite as much as it did a moment ago. “Konoha's quirky, what can I say.”

Sakura is about ninety-eight percent certain that’s not the whole story, since _quirky_ generally doesn’t lend itself to going through six sheriffs in two years. “I was expecting Sheriff Mizuki to hand things over in person,” is all she says, though. “Is he going to be around?”

Ino's brows lift, and she abruptly turns around to retrieve the coffee pot. “Didn’t anyone tell you?” she asks over her shoulder, and it’s more than a little suspicious that she’s very much not looking at Sakura. “Mizuki went missing about two months ago.”

No, Sakura can safely say the office didn’t mention anything about her predecessor _disappearing_. With a low groan, she rubs her forehead, and pushes her cup across the bar for a refill. She gets the feeling she’s going to need it. “No one looked into it?”

“And who exactly would have done that?” Ino asks dryly. “Our spare sheriff?”

Point, Sakura concedes with a sigh. Still, it’s a hell of a way to start her tenure. “Well, at least I know what to do first now. Any other major cases I should be aware of?”

Ino laughs like it’s a joke, though her grin has an edge to it that makes Sakura's instincts prickle. “I’ll let you know if I think of something. Wouldn’t want you to get bored.”

Somehow, Sakura suspects that isn’t going to be a problem.

“Hey, Yamanaka, what does a guy have to do around here to get a refill?” the scruffy-looking guy by the window calls, pointedly turning his mug upside down and waving it. It’s loud and sudden enough in the quiet diner to make Sakura startle, and while she doesn’t quite reach for her service weapon, the urge is there.

With a roll of her eyes, Ino pushes away from the bar again. “I don’t know, Kiba—maybe _pay your tab_ and find out.”

The dark-haired girl sitting next to him muffles a giggle behind her hand, while the guy in the sunglasses snorts. Kiba flushes, offering Ino a halfhearted glare as she approaches, and mutters something Sakura can't quite make out. Ino promptly cuffs him in the back of the head, a well-practiced motion, and Sakura hides a smile, turning back to her breakfast. In a town this size, everyone likely has lots of history with everyone else, and she’s going to need to get a feel for it quickly if she’s going to accomplish anything.

Officially, her tenure isn’t supposed to start until Monday, but Sakura was hoping to have a few days to settle in before she took over for Mizuki. Since that’s apparently not happening, and she’s already got a case, she might as well spend the day opening the office and learning the layout of the town. If Mizuki’s been missing for two months already, there likely isn’t much chance of finding him, whether he died in some sort of accident or ran away to Tea Country, but Sakura can't just _ignore_ her predecessor’s disappearance, even if everyone else seems happy to.

She idly drags her fork through the last of the whipped cream, considering. All she has with her is a single suitcase, which means she can definitely wait until later to move into her new house, and Mizuki probably left notes about whatever he was last working on at the station. Sakura isn’t fond of mysteries left unsolved—it’s one of the reasons she’s so good at her job—and she wants to put this one behind her quickly. Best to start at the station, then wander around town and maybe ask a few questions.

“Anything else I can get you?” Ino asks cheerfully as she breezes past, headed for the register. The older couple are making their way out, letting in a swirl of bitingly cold air as they leave, and Sakura tugs her jacket up over her shoulders a little more.

“Just the check, thanks,” she answers.

“Of course—” Ino starts, but she’s interrupted by the sudden, harsh jangle of the bells above the door as someone throws it open. Sakura twists automatically, eyes narrowing as the newcomer stalks past her, heading for Ino.

It’s a man, short but fairly muscular, with messy black hair and one equally black eye, a shark tooth on a cord around his neck. The right side of his face is viciously scarred, and the marks disappear under the neck of his Henley and continue over his wrist and hand. An eyepatch covers his left eye, and there are three short scars on his neck just behind his ear. None of the marks look like the kind of thing that was easily survived, and Sakura immediately gauges the man as dangerous just for that, even more than the way he carries himself or the scowl on his face as he plants himself in front of the register.

“Ino,” he says tightly.

Ino's smile is gone, and her eyes flicker to the wide windows for a split second before snapping back to the man. “Obito,” she returns, and it’s not quite fear on her face, but there’s definitely some kind of trepidation there. “What are you doing here? You—”

“Have you heard anything?” Obito demands before she can finish, fingers curling around the edge of the counter until his knuckles are white. “I don’t—I’ll take _anything_ at this point.”

Another glance at the windows, like she’s checking the street, and Ino leans forward, laying one hand over Obito's scarred fingers. “Not yet,” she says, quietly enough that Sakura almost misses it. “Look, I promised you I’d let you know, and I _will_ , but you can't be here right now.”

Well. Sakura isn’t entirely certain she likes the sound of that.

Obito shakes her off with a snarl, though he makes no move to leave. Slams his hands down instead, leaning forward, and Ino doesn’t quite lean back but her eyes narrow. It’s a warning, and Sakura wonders if she should step in.

“Then look _harder_ ,” Obito says, low and sharp. “I need _something_ or I swear, I'm going to burn this _whole fucking town_ to ash.”

That’s fear in Ino's face, without a doubt, but it’s buried before Sakura can so much as get her feet under her to stand and interrupt. The blonde’s lips firm, and though she hesitates for a moment her voice is perfectly clear when she says, “ _The Rasengan_ docked last night. They’ll be in port for at least a week. That’s as much as I've got.”

“Ino?” Kiba calls across the room, and out of the corner of her eye Sakura can see that the trio at the table are all still, no longer talking. The girl in particular is watching Obito carefully, pale violet eyes steady but intent, with one hand curled around the pendant she’s wearing.

“Mind your own business, Inuzuka,” Ino returns, her tone light. She touches Obito's hand again, a glancing pass, and then pulls away. “You should go,” she says quietly. A figure moves past the window, out of sight before Sakura can catch more than a shadow, and her mouth tightens. “You should _really_ go.”

Obito looks over too, and in an instant fury kindles in his face, mixed with something that’s almost like fear. He turn and heads for the door with a long stride, like he’s trying to outpace whoever just passed, and Sakura rises to her feet on instinct. She drops a twenty on the counter, more than enough to cover breakfast and a tip, and follows the man, just managing to catch the door as it falls shut behind him.

If there are going to be problems in her town, there's no way she’s going to ignore it.

Obito hasn’t gone far; he’s only a few meters down the sidewalk, but he’s bristling with fury and tense like he’s about to lunge. There's another man in front of him, taller and older, with stern, weathered features and dark brown hair, an expression of mixed distaste and cold anger on his face. Like Obito, he’s not dressed for the cold at all, wearing only a light oxford despite the freezing bite to the wind.

“—need to stop this idiocy,” the older man is saying as Sakura eases shut the diner door, careful not to make any noise. She can see the clear tension in his body, though he isn’t vibrating with contained violence the way Obito is.

“ _Stop_?” Obito spits, hands curling into tight fists. “I haven’t even _started_ yet, Fugaku. This is your last chance. Return what you took, or I'm going to _make you_.”

Fugaku's eyes narrow. “Mind your tone, boy,” he warns. “I'm the head of this family—”

“Not for much longer,” Obito growls, shoving forward to stab a finger into the older man’s chest. “You have until high tide. If you don’t change your mind by then, I'll set fire to everything you love and make you _watch_ as it burns to ash.”

As the younger man shoves past him, Fugaku half-turns, mouth opening like he’s about to add something, but before he can his gaze catches on Sakura and he stops short, irritation crossing his face. Without another word, he turns on his heel and heads in the opposite direction, vanishing around the corner. Obito is still walking, headed towards the harbor, but before Sakura can start after him he crosses the road right in front of a truck pulling a boat, and by the time the truck has passed he’s out of sight entirely.

Well. If Sakura was expecting a slow start to things, she was absolutely wrong.

Fingering her keys, she considers her options. Until she talks to a few locals, there's no way to know if that was a serious threat, the way it sounded, or if Obito just has anger issues and a lack of brain-to-mouth filter. That sounded pretty damn personal, but then, Sakura can't really judge. It’s a small town, and right now she’s completely blind to its politics and history.

The smart thing to do is head for the station and look up some records. She might not know where Obito is going right now, but she knows where he’s going to be at some point. Ino mentioned a boat, and _Rasengan_ is a unique enough name that Sakura should be able to figure out the owner fairly easily. Whoever that is might know something about the drama here.

Decided, Sakura unlocks her jeep and pulls herself in, then starts the engine. Out of the corner of her eye, she can see Ino watching her through the diner window, arms folded over her chest and expression thoughtful, but she turns away before Sakura can catch her gaze.

Small towns and their secrets. Sakura would say it’s frustrating, except for the fact that she’s more curious than annoyed.

She’s always enjoyed solving puzzles, and this looks like it could be an interesting one.

 

 

The police station is a tiny wooden building, dull white and weathered grey like the rest of the town, that’s sandwiched between a bookstore and an antiques shop. The lights are on, and Sakura wonders for a moment if Ino was just messing with her about Mizuki being missing, giving the newcomer a hard time. A shadow moves behind the frosted glass of the door, and with a faint frown Sakura gets out of her car and heads for the steps.

Just before she reaches them, the door swings open, and a small woman with a bob of brown hair framing her face gives her a friendly smile. “Morning, Sheriff!” she says cheerfully, stepping back so Sakura can enter.

A little warily, Sakura slips past her. The interior could generously be called spartan—two desks pushed up against opposite walls, a small holding cell with a cot, a bank of file cabinets, and not much else—and Sakura takes it in with a glance and turns to face the stranger. “Good morning?” she returns, and it comes out closer to a question than she intends.

The older woman just beams, offering a brief wave. “I'm Rin Nohara, the dispatch officer. And the crime scene tech. And I own the bookstore.”

 _Very_ small town, Sakura reminds herself, though she can't help but laugh a little as she offers her hand. “Sakura Haruno, but you already seem to know that. It’s nice to meet you.”

Rin's smile is sweet and a little bashful as she takes it with a firm grip. “Ino called me and warned me you were on your way over. I wanted to get the heat on before you arrived. Otherwise, everything’s pretty much as Mizuki left it. I neatened up a little right after he disappeared, but I figured whoever was here next would want to look into things.”

Well, that’s more than Sakura had expected. “You didn’t find anything in here?” she asks.

Rin shakes her head. “Everything was normal, except Mizuki headed out early and left me to lock up, and then just didn’t show up the next day. I gave it a week before I called the state office, but there was no sign of him after that night.”

That’s decidedly _less_ than Sakura was hoping for, but it’s hardly enough to turn her off the case. “Thanks,” she offers. “I appreciate it.”

“Anything I can do to help,” Rin agrees, though Sakura notices that she doesn’t offer up any hopes of finding Mizuki or uncovering his fate. Maybe she’s just resigned herself to his disappearance, but it’s still faintly suspicious in Sakura's mind.

Then again, at least two ex-boyfriends and one ex-girlfriend have told Sakura that suspicion is her default state and she needs to learn when to leave her job at the office. It’s vaguely possible they had a point.

Rin checks her watch, then winces. “I need to go open up,” she says apologetically. “I've got my radio with me, though, and yours is on the desk. I’ll let you know if something comes up, but Konoha's a quiet place. I wouldn’t worry too much.” One more wave and she’s trotting out the door, pulling a set of keys out of her pocket as she heads for the bookstore.

“Quiet,” Sakura says into the empty room after a long moment, somewhere between dry and disbelieving. “Right, definitely.” Because a sheriff just _going missing_ is an everyday thing, and scarred strangers threatening to burn the town to ashes isn’t worth blinking at. 

Maybe it’s not. Fugaku said _I'm the head of this family_ in a way that implied Obito was included, so they're probably related. Family spats can get ugly, Sakura knows from long experience, so maybe that’s all this was.

Sakura remembers the rage in Obito's face, the flash of something that was torn between fear and bloody-minded determination, _return what you took_ hissed out in a tone akin to desperation, and doesn’t think it is.

Also, on that note, what kind of time limit is _high tide_? Sakura's heard a lot in her time, but even when she ended up in Kiri for a stint hunting fugitives she never noticed people using the tides to mark time, just working around them.

Rolling her eyes a little at herself, Sakura turns towards the larger of the two desks, and is abruptly slapped in the face with the scent of hot coffee.

Sakura is better at sniffing out the nearest pot of coffee than she is coastal drug runners, and that’s saying something. Barely five seconds and she’s arrowing in on the small pot sitting up high on top of a file cabinet, the last few drops just brewing. There's a clean mug sitting beside it, and Sakura blesses Rin for the thoughtfulness as she pours a cup for herself.

Suddenly, searching registration records when all she has is a boat name doesn’t seem like such a chore.

There's more evidence of Rin's thoughtfulness in the page of login instructions and passwords tucked under the computer keyboard. Mizuki’s account is the one that opens, and Sakura spends a few minutes poking around in the most recently updated files. There's one open case involving a missing boy, with frustrated notes attached, but all the others are closed and waiting to be filed.

With a sigh—because of course it’s not that easy—Sakura turns to boat registrations instead. Mizuki’s been missing for a while already, and she would rather focus on figuring out whether there’s an immediate threat to the town.


	2. Of his bones are coral made

_The Rasengan_ is a piece of junk.

Sakura eyes it a little warily as she gets out of her jeep, taking in the faded orange paint on the hull. It’s an old commercial fishing boat, but without any of the equipment that the others docked around it sport, so clearly not in use. Or at least, not in use for fishing. The number of times it’s been stopped by the Coast Guard or Harbor Patrol makes Sakura absolutely certain that something else is going on.

The gangplank is down, and Sakura can hear voices from the deck. There's a flash of blond hair, and she checks her notes one more time and calls, “Hello? I'm looking for Naruto Uzumaki?”

“Come on up!” a cheerful voice calls back, and Sakura takes the ramp up and steps over the railing. There's a set of steps down onto the deck, and a man about her age perched on one of the deck chairs in front of the cabin. He smiles when he sees her, all golden hair and sky-blue eyes and deeply tanned skin, and waves cheerfully. “Hey there. What can I do for you?”

Hopefully, Sakura thinks, he didn’t notice her double-take. Why does Konoha have to be full of pretty people? It’s bad for her attention span.

“You're Naruto?” she asks, flicking a glance around the deck. He isn’t alone, though it takes a second to spot his companion. Another man, just as pretty as Naruto, with dark hair falling around his face and black eyes that are narrowed faintly, is sitting on the railing across from her, halfway in shadow, his legs dangling over the water and no shirt on. Sakura feels a sympathetic chill just looking at him.

“I am!” the blond says cheerfully, and then, “Oi, bastard, stop lurking and be friendly.”

The other man scoffs like this is a ridiculous suggestion, but he does turn, pulling one leg up on the rail and watching Sakura carefully from behind his hair.

He’s wearing _swimming_ _shorts_. In _March_. When it’s so cold Sakura is already mentally digging out her spare coat from the suitcase in her jeep.

She will never understand some people.

“That’s Sasuke,” Naruto says, clearly unbothered by his friend’s attitude. He smiles at Sakura, nearly blinding, and asks, “Did you need to hire our services?”

Sasuke makes an aggrieved noise. “Stop making us sound like prostitutes, idiot,” he retorts, folding his arms across his bare chest.

Very, very obviously, Naruto rolls his eyes. “Did you need to hire our services _transporting goods_?” he clarifies.

Sakura spent too long in Kiri not to realize the other meaning those words can have, for people who are a little light on the _law-abiding_ part of being law-abiding citizens. Suddenly the stops by the Harbor Patrol are making a hell of a lot more sense.

Still, she can address that later, when she _doesn’t_ need their help. “I'm Sakura Haruno,” she offers. “The new sheriff.”

The smile on Naruto's face doesn’t waver, even if Sasuke's expression pulls into a warning frown. “Let me guess,” the blond says cheerfully, though there's something sly in his expression that was hidden a moment ago. “You read Sheriff Mizuki’s notes on us?”

“Not yet,” Sakura tells him, arching one brow. “Should I?”

The smile brightens into a delighted grin, and Naruto laughs. “Not at all! The good sheriff never believed we were simple, honest businessmen with a bit of bad luck. But you're not that biased, right, Sakura?”

“That’s Sheriff Haruno to you,” Sakura corrects, though she can't entirely fight a smile. Even if he is probably a smuggler, Naruto is charming.

Sasuke makes an irritated sound. “Did you want something?” he demands.

Quite the contrast of personalities here, Sakura thinks wryly, glancing between them, but it’s a good enough reminder of why she’s here. “Do you know someone named Obito?” she asks, watching them carefully.

To her faint surprise, it’s Sasuke who blinks, turning to give her his full attention. “Obito _Uchiha_?”

“Is there more than one?” Sakura asks, dust-dry, and holds a hand a little above her head to indicate height. “About this tall, scarred, kind of growly?”

Sasuke frowns, glancing over at a suddenly tense Naruto and then back at Sakura. “He’s my cousin,” he says slowly, like he’s weighing the words. “Distantly. He’s back in town?”

“Should he not be?” Sakura checks his reaction, but he doesn’t looks nervous the way Ino did. Just surprised, though it flickers towards annoyance as he gives Sakura a dark look.

“Do you ever stop _asking_ _questions_?”

“It’s one of the perils of the job,” Sakura counters, keeping her voice mild. “Answer it, please.”

With a roll of his eyes, Sasuke huffs and says, “He was disinherited, and he left right afterwards. I haven’t seen him in almost ten years. Did he…do something?”

Sasuke's tone makes it sound like he has a specific ‘something’ in mind, but he doesn’t elaborate when Sakura raises a brow at him, so she decides not to push her luck and doesn’t ask. “He was threatening someone named Fugaku. I heard you know him, and I wanted to make sure I wasn’t going to have to arrest him for a homicide I could have prevented.”

Expression darkening, Sasuke looks at Naruto again. The blond stares back, and there's a whole conversation Sakura can't read condensed into a handful of seconds. “Fugaku is my father, and the head of the Uchiha family. He’s the one who disowned Obito.”

So. A definite motive there, and what Sakura heard could easily have been a demand for Fugaku to return his inheritance. As far as motivations go, she’s encountered thinner.

“Does Obito have a reason to believe you’d help him get his inheritance back?” Sakura prods.

Sasuke tenses subtly, but almost before it registers Naruto has already jumped in, still smiling and visibly sincere to that point that it’s a little bewildering. “Like the bastard said, it’s been ten years. We were still in high school when he left.”

A pause, and Sakura can see Sasuke visibly unclenching his muscles, though all he does is offer a tip of his head in agreement. “We’re _distant_ cousins,” he says. “And Obito was never close to any of the family. There's no reason for him to come to me.”

That, at least, sounds like the truth, so Sakura nods, accepting it. “Is he dangerous?” she asks, even though she’s already convinced that he is. He certainly didn’t act like someone harmless.

Sasuke's mouth tips up, just faintly, like she said something funny, but he only shrugs wordlessly. Apparently done with the conversation, he turns away, swinging his legs back over the side and facing the harbor pointedly.

Naruto gives Sakura a look that’s probably supposed to be commiserating but ends up edging closer to fondly amused. “That all you needed, Sheriff?” he asks cheerfully. “’Cause we might not have a lot of information about stray Uchihas, but I know the best places to eat in town! Ino's place is the best—the ramen is Choji’s specialty.”

“I thought that was the waffles,” Sakura says, bemused.

Naruto laughs like it’s a joke, and there's mischief in his grin. “So you found it already! Good. Ino's awesome.”

Sakura thinks about masses of blonde hair, warm blue eyes, and a flirty smile, the way it changed to flinty determination so easily, and has to take a breath. “Yeah,” she agrees. “I kind of got that impression.”

 

 

Well. At least her field trip scored her a last name, Sakura thinks, back in her office before noon and not entirely pleased by that. She’d much rather have someone to chase than sit around waiting for a call, but she doesn’t want to wander around the town when it looks like there's a storm rolling in.

She sits in front of the station windows, watching the first drops of rain fall, with another mug of coffee and her laptop open and running a search while she nominally familiarizes herself with Mitsuki's past cases. Obito Uchiha doesn’t exactly have a lengthy rap sheet, but there are mentions of warnings for fights stretching back to when he was in high school. Apparently he’s always been an aggressive bastard, though the fact that there _were_ fights isn’t exactly easing Sakura's mind where the murder thing is concerned. People escalate.

Still, Sasuke was telling the truth. There are absolutely no records of Obito in Konoha for the past ten years, and the car registered to him is from Ame, which is a solid two days from here driving without breaks.

Nothing’s happened yet, she tells herself firmly, setting the laptop aside with a sigh. A gut feeling doesn’t mean something’s going to, either. Just because Obito threatened Fugaku doesn’t mean he’s going to kill him.

Sakura's gotten pretty far listening to her gut, though. She’s a strong believer in instinct and intuition, especially coupled with intelligence, and this situation, even after a single brief encounter, is already setting off a bad feeling.

“Sheriff?”

Sakura starts, glancing up to find Rin hovering over her with a pair of brown paper bags. “Ms. Nohara,” she says, shaking herself. “Sorry, I didn’t hear you come in.”

“Just Rin is fine,” the other woman says warmly, taking a seat on the edge of the desk and offering Sakura one of the bags. “Here. I didn’t see you go for lunch, and Ino's does the best burgers. They're Choji’s specialty.”

Surprised, Sakura checks her watch, a little chagrined to find that it’s already creeping towards two in the afternoon and her stomach is growling. “Thanks, that’s really kind of you.”

Rin laughs, light and sweet, as she fishes out her own paper-wrapped burger and pulls her legs up under her to sit cross-legged. “It gave me an excuse to get a burger for myself,” she confesses without a hint of shame, offering Sakura a smile. “Are you settling in all right, Sheriff?”

The thick-cut fries are just as amazing as the waffles, hot and salty and crisp on the outside. Sakura swallows a large mouthful and nods. “Sakura,” she corrects. “I am. Konoha's a pretty town.”

Thunder rumbles outside, and the clatter of rain on the windows picks up. Rin snorts, though her smoky brown eyes are amused. “It has its charms,” she agrees. “Less of them in this weather, though.”

As she pulls her gaze from the street, though, her eyes drop to Sakura's computer and widen slightly. “You're—is that _Obito_?”

Sakura blinks, glancing between the tech and the screen, where Obito's unscarred mugshot is looking very displeased with everything. Though, Sakura supposes, if she’d been arrested for shoving another guy’s head through a wall, she wouldn’t be all that happy either. “You know him?”

Rin's expression pulls into something wry and a little sad. “We went to school together. He was one of my best friends right up until he left.”

Right. Small town. Sakura probably should have just asked her to begin with. “You know anything about why he left?”

“Uchiha family drama,” Rin says, like that explains anything, and the curve of her mouth is a lot closer to angry now. “They never liked Obito—he pretty much had to raise himself from the time he was a child. I don’t know what they had against him, but it was ridiculous. I was so _glad_ when he managed to get away after the accident.” She takes a breath that’s faintly shaky and presses her free hand over her eyes for a moment. “Sorry. I just—I don’t like the Uchiha very much, after the way they treated him. Obito might look a bit rough, but he was always one of the kindest people I knew. He’d go fifteen blocks out of his way to carry an old lady’s groceries home for her. Who even _does_ that?”

Not a guy who threatens to burn an entire town down, Sakura thinks, though she doesn’t say as much. Still, Rin's explanation is a bit more helpful than Sasuke's _Obito was never close to any of the family_ , because there's a big difference between being distant and being outcast.

“I just had a couple of questions for him,” she says, hoping that the reassurance will keep Rin from bolting to warn Obito herself. “He was at Ino's this morning and—”

“Obito's _in town_?” Rin demands, head jerking up as she meets Sakura's slightly startled gaze.

Strange, Sakura thinks, that his family and his best friend don’t know that fact, but Ino did. She had implied they’d talked before, even. _I promised you I’d let you know_ , she’d said. Easy enough to assume that Ino knows something no one else does, given the way they interacted. Sakura gets the feeling she’s not going to say much of anything, though.

“Do you know why he wouldn’t tell you?” she asks cautiously.

Rin makes a face, but instead of running for the door she takes a vicious bite of her burger. As soon as she’s swallowed, she makes a sound of grumpy irritation and answers, “Because Obito is an idiot when he thinks he’s protecting someone, and after the way he left, he probably thinks his uncle Fugaku will go after anyone he’s close to if he upsets his family, which him being back in town will definitely do. The Uchiha own most of the waterfront and a good portion of the land around the rivers here, so they have more influence than some people would like.”

It’s pretty clear she’s one of those people, by the expression on her face.

Though Sakura is fairly certain that Obito is trying to do more than _upset his family_ if he’s threatening his uncle, she doesn’t mention it. There's not much she can do at the moment besides keep an eye on things. Vague threats don’t hold much weight in court, and even if Obito was getting in Fugaku's face, he didn’t actually hit him. A lawyer might argue differently, but Sakura is going to keep hoping that things don’t escalate, no matter what her instincts tell her.

 

 

It’s dark and getting darker by the time Sakura leaves the station, locking the door behind herself and pocketing the keys. It feels weird not to leave a deputy on duty, to simply go home and shut things down, but after a whole twelve hours without Rin's radio going off even once, Sakura does feel a bit better about it than she would have that morning.

She spent the last few hours of the day familiarizing herself with repeat offenders, the open case Mizuki was working before his disappearance, and the more recent closed cases in the archives. There are a few that seem almost too simple, so easy it makes Sakura faintly wary, but she has to remind herself that it’s a small town and doesn’t have much at all in common with working Major Crimes in the capitol.

At least the storm from earlier has mostly passed, she thinks, though it’s still raining hard enough that she pulls her hood up as she heads for her jeep. There are already deep puddles scattered across the sidewalk, reflecting the light of the streetlamp above in dull yellow splotches that shatter under Sakura's boots.

“Hey!” someone calls, and Sakura stops sorting through her keys and glances up to see Ino jogging down the sidewalk towards her, closed umbrella in one hand and her long hair loose around her. Her smile is brilliant as she comes to a halt, still in the short purple skirt from earlier, though a long coat, open like she pulled it on in a rush, falls just above her knees. 

“Hey,” Sakura says, smiling in return, though there's a flicker of suspicion somewhere in the back of her mind. Ino's probably the only one who knows much of anything about Obito at the moment, and despite her determination to simply keep an eye on things, Sakura is still wary. “You look a little damp.”

Ino laughs, raising her closed umbrella. “I managed to grab my broken one this morning, so it’s going to be a very wet walk home.”

Logic is something Sakura is good at, but sometimes all of her common sense evaporates. Like now. “Want a ride?” she asks, despite the urge for caution. “You said you live close to the cabins, right?”

Ino's smile is really pretty, Sakura thinks a little despairingly. She might have the answers Sakura wants about Obito, but when she beams like that every urge to question her pretty much dries up.

“Thank you!” Ino says with clear relief, splashing around to the other side and waiting for Sakura to climb in and unlock the door before she gets in too. She pulls her coat off with a grimace before she settles into the seat, shifting it so that it can drip safely on the floormat, and adds, “Really, thank you. It’s a long walk to the cliffs, especially at night.”

It’s almost eleven at night, and small town or not, Sakura frowns at the thought of Ino walking home in the dark. “Do you have a car?” she asks, trying not to sound too worried as she flicks her headlights on and pulls out into the empty street.

Ino smiles like she can hear the concern anyway. “I do, but it’s in the shop and the mechanic is lazy. You can turn right up by that oak—it’s faster than going all the way back to the main road.”

Sakura eyes the rutted dirt road a little skeptically, but if this is an elaborate plot to kill her and get rid of potential law enforcement complications, she’s pretty sure she can overpower Ino and get away. Especially since she’s still carrying her service weapon and Ino's damp, clinging skirt and blouse aren’t hiding much of anything, let alone a weapon.

The suspicion wars with worry as Sakura watches Ino shiver, and she strangles a self-directed groan, leaning forward to turn the heat higher. “No trouble at the diner, then?”

Ino blinks, like she can't understand what Sakura is getting at, before it clicks and she chuckles. “You're referring to Obito, this morning? Oh, that was nothing! He’s just a little tense about family stuff right now and asked me to help him avoid his more objectionable relatives. He used to babysit me, and we kept in touch after he left.”

It makes sense, except for how it doesn’t. Sakura can't imagine Obito would ignore his best friend in favor of a kid he babysat, but she doesn’t ask for clarification, keeping her eyes on the road instead. Maybe it’s the truth—Sakura _hopes_ it’s the truth—but she doesn’t really think it is.

After several minutes—most of which Ino spends cozying up to the heater and complaining about her mechanic—the dirt road opens onto a paved driveway that splits into a lazy loop as the forest ends. There are a handful of small cabins sidled up against the edge of the cliff, kept fairly private by tall hedges with glossy green leaves. Two have cars parked in front of them, but the rest are dark.

“Number 5 is yours,” Ino says, pointing to one near the center of the loop. “Keys are in the mailbox. Mizuki was in Number 9—Rin told me you’d probably want to check it out. I can get you the keys tomorrow.”

Well, this certainly isn’t the murder attempt Sakura was halfway expecting. She smiles a little, slowing as they approach the cabin, and asks, “So where am I taking you?”

“Here is fine,” Ino answers cheerfully, and as soon as Sakura comes to a stop she hops out, dragging her coat around her shoulders. “My house is down that hill and to the right. It’s only about a minute walking.”

Sakura eyes the path leading down, but it’s well-lit and fairly broad, and this is Ino's property. She doesn’t want to push. “All right. I don’t know if you have my number—”

“It was on your housing application.” Ino gives her a cheeky smile. “I hope you don’t mind that I took the liberty.”

Sakura can't help but laugh at Ino's boldness. “I think I can let it slide, just this once. As long as you don’t have any nefarious plans for it.”

“Nefarious is my favorite word, though,” Ino says without a hint of shame, tossing her hair back. She winks at Sakura, then picks up an easy jog, holding her closed umbrella above her head to ward off the remaining rain.

Sakura watches the sway of her bright hair until she’s out of sight, then sighs and forces herself to move, grabbing her suitcase and hauling it out of the back seat. The keys are right where Ino said they would be, and the door opens easily, revealing a neat interior painted in shades of pale blue. When Sakura flips on the light, it illuminates a short hallway that opens into a living room, with a small kitchen area and breakfast nook overlooking the ocean below. There's another hall leading off the main room, with a bedroom on either side and a bathroom on the left. Sakura picks the bigger bedroom, and is unspeakably grateful to find that the bed is already made up with fresh-smelling sheets and fluffy pillows.

Vague suspicions aside, Ino might just be her favorite person in the world right now.

She dumps her suitcase by the chest of drawers, opens it to dig out her pyjamas and toiletry kit, and heads for the bathroom. As soon as she’s brushed her teeth and dressed, she collapses into bed, drops her phone on the nightstand, drags the heavy comforter up over herself, and is out within seconds of closing her eyes.

 

 

The loud, obnoxious jangling of her phone wakes her, and Sakura is muttering curses before she even surfaces from her nest of blankets. The screen is blinding against the darkness of the bedroom, but Sakura squints enough to make out the word _Dispatch_ and groans.

“Hello?” she demands, already sliding out of bed and reaching for her clothes.

“Sorry to wake you, Sakura,” Rin says apologetically, not sounding all that happy to be awake herself. “But you need to get to the Landing as soon as possible.”

‘The Landing’ doesn’t sound like the kind of place Sakura's GPS is going to be able to find, and after getting lost so many times on the way to Konoha, she’s justifiably wary of using it at all. “How close is that to the cabins?”

“Just a few minutes south,” Rin answers immediately. “Get back to the main road headed towards town, and in about five miles the parking lot will be on your left. The path down to the beach is well-marked. I’ll meet you there.”

She hangs up, and Sakura mutters one of her old boss’s more inventive curses, realizing that this means it’s probably a crime scene _on a_ _beach_. Meaning way too much sand and a lot of aggravation, no matter what the case is. Hopefully they have a while before the tide comes in, because scrambling to beat the ocean to their evidence is not Sakura's favorite thing ever.

What a lovely quiet town, she thinks wryly, and gets moving.


	3. Those are pearls that were his eyes

The Landing is a narrow strip of beach that curves in a lazy crescent around the bay, one point protruding far out into the water and crowned with a bleached-white lighthouse. Two cars and an ambulance are already parked at the edge of the sand when Sakura pulls in, and she can see Rin and two other figures through a gap in the dunes.

That the path is ‘well-marked’ is largely an exaggeration, but it’s the only spot that’s mostly passable, even if it is choked by beach grass. Sakura minds her footing, in no mood to end up knee-deep in sand before the sun even rises fully. There’s enough light to see by, but not much more than that.

“Good morning, Sakura,” Rin greets her with a slightly wan smile as she approaches, leaving deep footprints in the sand.

“Morning,” Sakura returns, because judging by the body lying face-down in the sand, _good_ is probably pushing things a little. She takes a quick look—a man, bulky with muscle and dressed in workman’s clothes, a long knife in a sheath on his belt—and then glances towards the next body, where an older woman with two blond pigtails and a doctor’s white coat is crouched beside what’s little more than a torso and a pair of legs.

Sakura swallows, and is very glad she didn’t stop to make coffee or grab food before she left the house.

“They washed in with the tide,” Rin says, following her gaze. “Or, well, several pieces were washed a ways down shore, and Sai found them while he was taking a walk.” She nods to the other figure, a man a little older than Sakura with bone-white skin and dark hair, standing off to the side with a woman Rin's age. “He called me about the limbs, and then found the bodies. Doctor Tsunade is just looking them over.”

 _Pieces_ always make for a bad start to any day, Sakura decides. “The M.E.?” she asks, and Rin falls into step with her as she picks her way across the sand.

Rin nods. “And her assistant Shizune. They run the clinic.”

More people pulling double duty, though that’s hardly a surprise by now. Everyone here seems to have at least two jobs. Well, except Naruto and Sasuke, who seem settled in as smugglers, but Sakura decides not to count those two.

“Time of death was about four this morning,” Tsunade says without looking up, carefully making a note on her clipboard. “I’ll need to take them back to the clinic to be sure, but I think I can safely say cause of death was massive blood loss due to having his arms torn off.”

“Torn?” Sakura repeats, and there's a sinking feeling somewhere down in her chest. “Did he get stuck in something?”

Tsunade glances at her, one brow rising, and then at Rin. “Did you get photos already?”

Rin pats the camera around her neck. “You're fine, Doctor.”

With a satisfied nod, Tsunade turns the body over, careful of the red-stained sand, and it’s all Sakura can do not to take a step back. _Torn_ is definitely the right word—those are _teeth marks_ in the corpse’s shoulder, long and clearly sharp, scored into the flesh where the man’s shirt was ripped away. Sakura almost wants to say it was knives that did this, maybe thin stilettos, but that’s undeniably the shape of a mouth. A _big_ mouth.

“Damn,” she finally manages.

Tsunade snorts, though her eyes are mostly amused. “Damn,” she agrees.

A step back, a breath, and Sakura pushes down all of the horror, all the nausea, to focus on what she can see. Teeth marks, maybe from a shark, but the men clearly weren’t swimming since they're both completely clothed. The man still in possession of his limbs is carrying a weapon, and Sakura's willing to bet the other one was as well. They look the type.

“Did anything wash up with them?” she asks, crouching down to study the remains. The same rough clothes, heavy boots, dark colors—clearly the men were doing _something_ together that meant they needed to dress this way. Sakura doesn’t have a very good feeling about whatever it was.

Rin pulls a notebook from her jacket pocket and flips it open, running a finger over the neat lines there. “I checked up and down the beach a ways, but all I found was the first man’s other boot, a couple of shell casings with no gun, and a necklace. I'm not sure if it’s connected or if it just washed up at the same time, though.”

Shell casings mean shots, probably from a shotgun in this area. Sakura rocks back, considering, and then asks, “No one reported hearing any gunfire?”

Rin just shrugs, her smile wry. “We’re a good ways from anywhere right now. Sai is the closest resident, and he lives almost two miles away. He says he didn’t hear anything.”

Sakura takes another glance at the man, who doesn’t look very shaken for having been the one to find a torn-off limb on his morning stroll. “Alibi for him?”

“You want an alibi from _Sai_?” Rin blinks, clearly surprised by the question, and turns to call, “Sai, anyone with you this morning?”

Dark eyes flicker over to them, and Sai gives a smile that Sakura clocks as probably eighty percent bullshit, which immediately puts her hackles up. “Shikamaru came over yesterday to look at my truck and spent the night,” he says with a cheer that’s vaguely abrasive, standing in front of two corpses as they are. “Does this mean I'm a suspect?”

“You're not, don’t worry,” Rin tells him, which makes Sakura frown. Catching the expression, Rin rolls her eyes a little, though her smile is wry. “Sai's odd, but he’s an artist, not a murderer,” she tells Sakura quietly. “And Shikamaru will vouch for him, I'm sure.”

Sakura makes a mental note to check that one personally, even as she gives Rin a quick smile. “I have to ask.”

“Of course.” Rin smiles back, and then glances at her notebook again. “I pulled fingerprints from the bodies, so if you don’t need me I’ll head back and run them. IDs should help us figure out where to start.”

If Rin doesn’t know these two by sight in a town this small, they’re probably from somewhere else. Sakura nods, then glances down the beach to where it fades into fog. “Are there any other parking areas around here?” she asks.

Rin nods, pointing towards the edge of land right before it curves out into the sea. “About a mile and a half down, there's a small public garden with beach access, and past that is another parking lot. The caretaker passed away a few years ago, so it’s mostly overgrown now.”

Making it a perfect place to leave a car you don’t want found, Sakura thinks, and zips her jacket up a bit more tightly. “I’ll cordon things off and meet you back at the station in a bit. I want to see if they drove here.”

“All right,” Rin agrees with a smile. “Don’t worry about roping the beach off, though. I’ll set a warning up near the road. This place isn’t very popular, and the tide comes in pretty early. A few hours and it’ll be under water.”

Sakura pauses, eyes narrowing. “The tide,” she repeats slowly, and the image of Obito snarling at Fugaku comes back all too clearly. “Any chance you know when high tide was?”

Rin tips her head thoughtfully, and then her eyes widen. She glances back at the bodies before she turns to Sakura again, and says, “It would have been just before four this morning. Three fifty-six, if I'm remembering correctly.”

So right around the time of death for their two victims. Right around the time of the deadline Obito gave Fugaku.

Sakura is pretty sure it’s enough of a coincidence to make Obito a suspect.

She doesn’t say anything to Rin, though—if she and Obito were friends, that’s a pretty big conflict of interest, and while Rin's been good at her job so far, Sakura doesn’t want to draw a line for her to toe. If she gets more evidence, or if she brings Obito in, she’ll have to explain it, but for now she files the thought away and lets it simmer.

“Can I help?” Sai asks, and Sakura twitches, startled. She spins to face him, and even though she’s on alert right now she would have sworn she didn’t hear him move at all.

“I’m sorry?” she says evenly, trying to get her heartrate back under control.

Sai smiles, and it’s still that strangely plastic expression that kind of makes Sakura want to punch it off his face. “The caretaker of the garden, who passed away—he was my adopted brother. I have the keys to the main gate, if you like. Entering from the road is easier than walking down the beach.”

With a thoughtful noise, Rin looks him over. “It’s still tied up legally, but you technically own it, don’t you, Sai? I’d forgotten.”

This time, Sai's smile is a little smaller, a little softer, and entirely real. “Shin left it to me,” he confirms, and glances at Sakura expectantly. “Sheriff?”

“That’s very helpful, thank you,” Sakura says, offering a small smile in return. “My car’s up here, if you don’t mind riding with me.”

“For the best,” Sai says, and that tone is back to being obscenely cheerful. “My car died in the parking lot.”

“Another one?” Rin asks, somewhere between amused and despairing. “You're keeping Shikamaru in business all by yourself, at this point.”

There's a cheerfully wicked edge to Sai's smile, and it makes Sakura like him a little more as a person, if he can make that face. It probably means hell for whoever the sentiment is directed at, but Sakura approves nevertheless. “Ah, he keeps making me cook for him and do his laundry, I think this is a fair trade. Have a good day, Ms. Nohara.”

“ _Rin_ ,” she corrects with a roll of her eyes, but smiles and waves him off, and Sai dips his head and turns back towards the path up to the road.

Sakura falls into step with him, careful of her footing, and asks, “Shikamaru is a mechanic?”

“The only one in town,” Sai confirms cheerfully. “He’s very bad at it.”

Easy enough to remember Ino's rant about the mechanic’s laziness last night, and Sakura can't help but smile a little. “So I've heard. I can drop you at home when we’re done, if you’d like.”

“That’s very kind of you. It’s a bit of a walk, and I don’t think Shikamaru is awake yet to come get me.” Sai casts a look at the sky, but it’s so heavily overcast with grey that there's no hope of seeing the sun. The light level means it’s probably a little after sunrise, but there's no real way of knowing without a clock.

Sakura doesn’t blame Shikamaru for sleeping in. She hadn’t planned to laze around this morning, but she’d been hoping for something other than a crime scene at dawn. Casting a look back at the beach right before it vanishes behind the dunes, she grimaces, tapping her fingers against the webbing of her holster. A missing sheriff _and_ a murder, all before she’s been here even twenty-four hours—it’s looking like Konoha isn’t going to be anywhere near as quiet as she was planning on.

Strangling a sigh that’s more resignation than anything, she trudges back up to the lot and steps onto the pavement, knocking sand from her boots. Sai is halfway into his hatchback, gathering things up, and Sakura takes one look at the interior and feels her brows rise. It’s _immaculate_ , to the point where she would easily believe it just left the dealer’s lot brand new. The only sign of use is the stack of blank canvases and the folded easel in the back and the travel mug in the front cup-holder. Having a car that clean is honestly just as creepy as that plastic smile, and Sakura's not getting any instinctual off feelings about Sai beyond the obvious, but—

Creepy, she thinks, amused at herself, just as Sai emerges with a canvas bag and a paint-stained metal lunchbox. He gives her a cheerful smile and says, “Sorry to hold you up, sheriff.”

“Not a problem,” Sakura answers, and waves him around to the passenger side of her jeep as she unlocks it. Sai slides in easily, setting his things at his feet, and Sakura starts the car and asks, “Rin said you're an artist?”

“I own the gallery in town,” Sai confirms, and that’s another real smile, startling in juxtaposition to the other fake ones. “Ink, on the far end.”

Sakura still needs to actually take a walk around Konoha at some point. So far she’s managed to see the diner, her office, and the marina, which might be a decent sampling of Konoha's busiest spots, but isn’t anywhere near enough if she’s going to be working here. “I haven’t made it that far yet, but I’ll have to swing by.”

“Checking up on my alibi?” Sai seems perfectly unbothered by the thought, though. “There's an interesting exhibit up right now, if you're interested. The theme is nightmares.”

Sakura blinks, glancing over at him in some surprise. Though, she supposes, even in a coastal town like this people probably get tired of painting ocean views. “Nightmares? I’ll have to make time.”

“Please do.” Sai looks out the window as she takes the turn onto the road, and his eyes settle on the lighthouse in the distance. Something flickers across his face, there and gone in the space of a heartbeat, but all he says is, “Are you enjoying Konoha so far, Sheriff?”

 _I just had to wake up before dawn to come see a corpse that looks like it’s been_ chewed on _, and another that was pretty much dismembered_ , Sakura thinks. “It’s interesting,” she allows.

There's an edge to Sai's next smile, like he can hear what she’s thinking. “It’s a very small town,” he says. “Isn’t it odd that those can be the most interesting kinds of places?”

A shiver slides down Sakura's spine, and her hands tighten on the wheel. There's something almost ominous in Sai's tone, something traced with a dark warning despite the innocuous words, and she risks a glance over at him only to see he’s staring out at the lighthouse again, dark eyes entirely unreadable.

“Were you born here?” she asks, and tries to keep it from sounding like a challenge. Or maybe an interrogation.

Sai hums, light and a little eerie. “I have no idea. Shin and I grew up at the orphanage in the forest. Anything that came before that I was too young to remember.”

Maybe that explains his personality quirks, Sakura tells herself. Her classes in childhood psychology were a long time ago, but she knows neglect, even the benign sort, has dealt with children suffering it before. It can definitely leave its mark.

“Here,” Sai says before she can think of an answer. He leans forward, pointing to a drive crowned with an intricate wooden archway. The drive itself passes through a long tunnel of leaning trees, branches interwoven, and it’s dim enough that Sakura is glad for her lights. She follows the curves up to a wrought-iron gate, the metal crafted to look like tangled ivy, and puts the jeep in park as Sai digs through his bag and comes up with a key ring.

“Shin did the metalwork,” he says, and it’s almost wry. “I designed it to be covered with real ivy, but he liked more permanent things.” Sliding out, he trots up to the gate, sorting through keys, and—

Stops. Goes entirely, eerily still, staring down at the chain holding it shut.

A bad feeling curling in her gut, Sakura turns the engine off and gets out as well, grabbing a pair of nitrile gloves and an evidence bag out of the pocket in the door. “Sai?” she asks.

“Someone cut the padlock,” Sai says, perfectly, unnervingly cheerful, and if Sakura thought his smiles were fake before, it’s nothing in comparison to this one. “I haven’t been here in weeks, but someone opened the gate after the rain stopped last night.”

At a glance, it’s easy enough to see the evidence. The padlock is on the ground, and there are deep scrapes in the mud on either side of the gate, not yet washed out. With the ruts in the road, it’s hard to tell if a car passed through, but Sakura is willing to bet it did.

“I’ll take the lock and the chain, see if Rin can get prints off them,” she says, carefully picking up the broken lock and bagging it. The work of bolt cutters, probably, and that raises the odds that it wasn’t just some teenagers going where they weren’t supposed to.

Sai inclines his head, though his eyes are trained beyond the gate, towards a break in the trees where Sakura can just make out a small cottage covered with roses. They're blooming, which is a little jarring given that it’s still early spring. She’d thought roses were summer flowers.

“We can walk from here,” Sai says, dragging his eyes away. He pushes lightly on the gate, letting it swing open a foot or two with perfect silence, and then slips through the gap, heading for the cottage. Sakura follows, keeping half an eye on the woods. There's no obvious threat, but it feels like something is watching them. And while that could be the feeling of the forest in general, dark and shadowed as it is, but…her instincts are telling her it’s not.

Sakura's only alive because she’s spent her career listening to her instincts, so she isn’t about to stop now.

“You said you haven’t been here in a few weeks?” she asks, scanning the trees, then glancing at the cottage as they round the corner. There's a small sign out front advertising the garden, a closed sign in the door. The house looks undisturbed, at least, but Sakura still gives it a wide berth as they walk by.

“Four at least,” Sai confirms, and he’s still smiling but it’s as unsettling as the hush beneath the trees. “There was an error on the paperwork, and it’s making the inheritance complicated. I try to keep an eye on it, though with the exhibition I've been tied up.”

Sakura opens her mouth to answer, but a flash of movement catches her eye. She spins, grabbing for her service weapon, and catches a flash of dark cloth through the trees, moving fast. It vanishes into the bushes in an instant, and without even having to think Sakura takes off after it, leaping the low fence that edges the road and bolting through the trees. Whoever it is isn’t even trying to be stealthy, just _fast_ —Sakura can keep up, but she isn’t closing ground, and that’s something that hasn’t happened in more foot chases than she can count.

With a curse, she skids around a wide oak, ducks a low-hanging bough, and vaults a narrow creek. Ahead of her, the person stumbles, just for a moment, and Sakura puts on a burst of speed, shouting, “Stop! Police, stop!”

In the shadows, she can't make out a face, just a flash of pale skin as the person glances back. Then the figure breaks through the edge of the tree-line, stumbles again, and leaps up the dune. Sakura swears, holsters her gun, and follows as fast as she’s able. She makes it to the top of the rise just in time to see the figure bolt for the water, still running flat-out. There's nothing _there_ , though, no boat, no way out, and Sakura doesn’t even want to _think_ about how cold the ocean must be right now.

“Stop!” she calls, “I just want to know why you were trespassing—god _damn it_!”

Without so much as a pause, the person hits the edge of the water and keeps going, splashing out up to their knees and then flinging themselves forward as a wave rolls in. Sakura watches them go under, stumbling through the wet sand to get to the shore, and waits for them to surface, debating the wisdom of going in after them when she doesn’t have anything resembling a wetsuit.

But no one comes up for air.

Sakura frowns, checks her watch, then scans the water again. People can't hold their breath _that_ long, especially in water this cold, and she’s got a good view of pretty much the entire bay from here, but there's nothing. No sign of movement, no heads popping up, just the roll of the tide going out. It doesn’t seem likely they would have drowned themselves just to get away from a trespassing fine, either.

She gives it five minutes, then scans the shore on either side of her, and when nothing jumps out at her she turns away, not wanting to leave Sai on his own so close to where the two men were murdered. There's no proof that the runner was anything but a trespasser, after all, spooked by the sight of people where there shouldn’t be, and as much as Sakura wants to convince herself otherwise, not _everyone_ she comes across is a suspect.

Still, she casts one more look back before she steps into the trees. There's nothing to see but the ocean, the empty beach, the flicker of the lighthouse at the far end of the bay. The silence is unsettling, and Sakura makes a face at the shoreline, entirely fed up with the morning.

She hasn’t even had her _coffee_ yet.

Sai isn’t waiting by the cottage when she stalks out of the trees, but it’s easy enough to follow the curve of the road into the small parking lot. Beyond it is a stone archway leading into a desperately overgrown garden, but Sakura's attention immediately slides to where Sai is perched on the wooden fence, watching her. There's a pickup truck parked next to him, with Fire Country plates, and it looks far too dusty to have been out in last night’s rain.

“You didn’t catch them?” Sai asks, tilting his head and smiling. “Ah, and here I thought you were good at your job. Too bad.”

Sakura tells herself it’s rude to punch him in the face, no matter how much he deserves it. Also, writing herself up for assault is not a process she wants to go through ever again.

“They jumped into the ocean,” she says, when she can manage to un-grit her teeth. “No idea who it was?”

“None,” Sai says cheerfully. “Or who owns this truck.” He nods at it, and when Sakura gives him a wary look clarifies, “I didn’t touch it. I've watched crime shows before.”

“Small mercies,” Sakura mutters, then pulls out her notebook and takes down the plates and the make and model. No way to tell if it actually belongs to the men, but it’s more likely than not. As soon as Rin gets names and she can link them to the truck, she’ll get it towed back to the town.

With a sigh, she tucks the book back into her pocket, checks that she’s still carrying her car keys, and scans the forest one more time. “Come on,” she says. “Rin told me you live close by?”

“Up towards the top of the mountain,” Sai agrees, smiling. “The turn is half a mile down from here.” He casts one more look at the cottage before following Sakura back to the gate, peaceably silent as Sakura watches the forest. There's no sign of other people, though, no sound beyond birdsong, and Sakura forces herself to breathe out as she gets in her jeep and starts the engine.

The thought strikes her halfway through shifting gears, and she pauses even as Sai glances at her curiously. Automatically, she turns towards the ocean, even though it’s well out of sight, and bites her lip.

Whatever killed those men likely dragged them into the water or killed them there. And that runner—they dove into the water and didn’t come back up. Sakura wants to think she’d have noticed someone being _eaten_ beneath the surface, but—

What if there's a connection? It’s a tenuous, vague idea, but just like the thought that Ino knows more than she’s saying, Sakura can't let go of it. Whether there's something there or not, she’s going to get her teeth in this bone, and she won't let go until she’s found her answers.


	4. Nothing of him that doth fade

Sai lives in small, two-story log cabin in the middle of an orchard, just beyond a large pond. It’s pretty, a little rough but clearly well cared for, and there's an old truck parked out front next to a much newer station wagon.

There's also a man waiting for them, tall and handsome, his hair pulled up into a bushy ponytail. As Sakura comes to a stop, he pushes up from the porch swing, expression caught somewhere between irritation and relief, and comes down the steps to meet them.

“Why isn’t your phone on, idiot?” is the first thing he says, leveling an exasperated look at Sai. “And where is your car?”

Sai blinks, then digs through the pockets of his coat. It takes a few seconds, but eventually he comes up with a mobile. Nothing happens when he clicks the button, and he tilts his head. “I must have forgotten to charge it last night,” he offers. “Were you trying to call me?”

The man stares at Sai in a way that makes Sakura think her instinctive desire to punch him in the face isn’t an isolated incident. “Sai, I woke up and the house was empty. I had to find out _from my mother_ that you wandered into a _murder_ this morning. Of course I was trying to call you.”

“Less a murder and more the aftermath,” Sai corrects cheerfully, then pauses. An expression of pure bewilderment crosses his face. “Shikamaru, why would your mother care that I wandered into a murder?”

Shikamaru looks at him for several long moments, then groans and rubs his temple. “Troublesome,” he mutters. Instead of answering Sai, he nods to Sakura. “Sheriff Haruno, thanks for bringing him back.”

Sakura strangles the grin that threatens and tips her head in return. “It’s not a problem. He was helping me, so it’s the least I could do.”

Something flickers across Shikamaru's face, calculation and assessment, and he glances back at Sai. “The garden?” he asks.

“There was a car parked there that might be related,” Sai confirms easily, and must catch sight of whatever expression Sakura is wearing, because he smiles and adds, “Shikamaru is good at puzzles.”

That seems like an understatement, honestly. Sakura lifts her brows, looking Shikamaru over, and says a little dryly, “I feel like I should deputize you.”

Shikamaru makes a face. “A regular job? Too troublesome. I’d get hives. Speaking of which.” He gives Sai a pointed glance. “Your car?”

The edge of wicked amusement Sakura saw before returns, and Sai beams. “Dead by the Landing,” he says. “The engine wouldn’t turn over.”

“God damn it.” Shikamaru looks tired. “I just fixed that thing last month. Why do cars hate you so much.”

Sai laughs, bright and amused, and Sakura can't help a flicker of surprise. When he’s happy, he’s _gorgeous_ , and it’s a little surprising given how ardently she’d wanted to punch him a few minutes ago. Usually that kills at least some of the attraction for her.

Konoha's plague of pretty people strikes again, apparently.

Something in Shikamaru's face has softened as well, but he rolls his eyes, heaves a sigh, and says, “I'm not leaving the house for at _least_ another three hours, but if you make breakfast, I might be persuaded to go look at it later.”

“Hard-boiled eggs would be nice,” Sai agrees, in a tone that means he’s only saying it because he knows they wouldn’t be.

“ _Actual_ food,” Shikamaru retorts. “Not gross things. I'm doing you a _favor_ , idiot.”

Sai laughs, waves a hand to Sakura in farewell, and trots up the front steps. A small black cat twists out from under the swing to tangle his feet, and he scoops it up, sets it on his shoulders, and pushes inside.

With a sigh that doesn’t know whether it’s fond or exasperated, Shikamaru rubs a hand over his tightly bound hair and then says, “Thanks for not punching him. I know he’s troublesome.”

“I like him,” Sakura says, and is a little surprised to find that it’s true. “He’s a character.”

“That’s a good way of putting it,” Shikamaru agrees, and there's a smile threatening at one corner of his mouth. He reaches up to tug on one of his earrings, and then asks, “That murder—should we be worried?”

Sakura hesitates. She wants to say no, because the two victims were there doing _something_ , and if they were carrying weapons on a lonely beach at four in the morning she’s willing to assume they weren’t there for benign reasons. But—

The teeth marks, long and sharp like knives. The way they were practically dismembered. The fact that the swimmer disappeared so completely.

“I’d stay out of the water,” she says finally. “But I wouldn’t worry too much otherwise.”

Shikamaru snorts. “No one’s going to go in the water in the first place,” he says, dry as dust. “Not in Konoha, and especially not in spring. But I’ll mention it to people. Thanks, Sheriff.”

“No problem. Have a good day.” Sakura nods, then turns and heads for her car. As she climbs in, she catches a glimpse of Sai through the window, cat in his arms, watching her go. He smiles when he catches her gaze, and it’s too far away to tell if it’s fake or not. Then Shikamaru pushes through the door, and Sai turns away, letting the curtain fall down across the glass.

Somehow, Sakura would swear she feels eyes on her all the way back through the orchard, prickling across the nape of her neck and making her heart beat just a little bit faster than it should.

 

 

Rin's lab is a tiny building attached to the back of her bookstore, and while it’s not the most unusual setup Sakura's ever seen, it’s a vaguely amusing one. She slips into the bookstore, taking a look at the tall, neatly ordered shelves and staircase leading up to a landing with a reading area, and smiles, because it feels like Rin—neat, orderly, and welcoming, with a buried air of eccentricity in the hand-painted signs and the scattered tables bearing skeletal trees made of twisted wire, hung with ornaments and bookmarks and jewelry. It’s cute, and Sakura thinks wistfully of all the books she left in storage and has to resist the urge to browse.

“Just a minute!” Rin calls from the back when the bell above the door chimes as it falls shut.

“It’s me,” Sakura calls back, and ducks around the register and through the open doorway, leaning around the edge of the opening. “Safe to come down?”

“Sakura!” Rin glances up from her computer with a cheerful smile and waves her in. “Did you find a car?”

Sakura lifts the printout she’s carrying. “Registered to a man with an extensive criminal record. Last name Zori.”

With a frown, Rin pulls up another screen, leaning forward to scan the list of names. “That’s one of the matches that came up for the body that was dismembered. I haven’t had a chance to do a comparison yet, but from a glance they look like the same prints.”

Given the man’s record, Sakura isn’t surprised. She sets the evidence bag with the broken lock down on the table and offers, “This might have matching prints, since the car is his. Or it’s from his friend who didn’t end up in pieces.”

“Waraji,” Rin says, with a quick flash of a satisfied smile. “I got that one done already. He skipped out on his parole officer a few weeks ago and had a warrant out. I’ll dust for prints in a minute. You can leave it over with the rest of the evidence.”

Sakura eyes the sparse bin as she moves the lock over. Not much to go on, and—

She stills.

“This is all from the beach?” she asks, and her tone comes out a little sharper than intended.

It makes Rin turn back from her computer, eyes wide. “Yes?” she offers, more question than statement, but Sakura doesn’t have a spare thought to care right now. Leaning over, she carefully picks up one of the evidence bags and holds it up, staring at the contents. A shark tooth on a cord, inexpertly wrapped with a length of wire but clearly well-worn, and she saw it just yesterday morning, hanging around someone’s neck.

“Obito was wearing this,” she says, and there's no doubt that it’s the same one. It looks handmade, the leather of the cord frayed in places, the handful of black stone beads rubbed smooth. Definitely not a mass-produced trinket, and she eyes the snapped end of the cord, wondering if it got caught in the struggle somehow.

There's a long moment of silence, and when Sakura glances up, Rin is staring at the necklace, mouth tight. “I've never seen it before,” she says, and chews on her lower lip for a second before she shakes her head. “But—that doesn’t mean anything. I haven’t even talked to Obito in almost two years.”

“He’s involved in this somehow,” Sakura says, though she can't make it quite as gentle as she intends. “I need to find him.”

Rin pauses, hesitates, but then her expression firms. “I don’t know where Obito would be, but I know where to find Fugaku,” she offers.

Two sides to every story, Sakura thinks, remembering the cold anger on Fugaku's face when Obito confronted him. At the very least he should know why Obito is after him, and at this point any pieces at all will help them put this case together.

“Address?” she asks, reaching for her notebook.

Mouth a set line, Rin pushes to her feet. “I’ll do you one better,” she says, and that expression is all stubborn determination. “I’ll show you the way.”

Well. There's every chance that this will end badly, but Sakura also has no deputy, no knowledge of the town, and only a vague understanding of the history involved. At the very least, Rin will know if Fugaku lies outright, and that’s valuable enough for Sakura to take the risk.

“All right,” she agrees. “Do you need to close up?”

“Just the lab part.” Rin waits until she’s stepped back into the bookstore, then pulls the door shut and secures it. “Hinata should be here soon to keep an eye on things.”

It seems like a bigger risk than most store owners would take, but Sakura supposes Rin knows the town better than she does. There's definitely not much in the way of reported break-ins, either, so hopefully it will turn out fine.

“Where are we going?” she asks, doing a quick check to make sure she didn’t leave anything in the office before she pulls herself into her car.

Rin takes the passenger seat without hesitation, strapping in and then telling her, “Fugaku usually spends the mornings at the riverfront. There’s a shipping yard near the mouth of the Nakano, and he oversees operations there. Take the highway east about ten miles, then left onto District Road.”

It’s decidedly more hands-on that Sakura would have expected after seeing him on the street—she’d assumed real estate, or maybe stock market trading. She pulls out onto the quiet street, checking her mirrors, and then says, “You told me Fugaku would be upset at Obito being back in town. Is there a reason beyond not getting along?”

For another moment, Rin hesitates, chewing her lip. “I can't think of one,” she admits. “They both cut ties pretty thoroughly after the accident.” At Sakura's questioning glance, she grimaces. “There was an accident, a couple of years after we graduated. Obito got swept into a cave up by the cliffs while we were swimming, and we couldn’t find him before the tide came in. Everyone thought he had drowned, or been killed on the rocks, but a few weeks later he washed up on the shore with those scars. He wouldn’t say anything about how he got them, and he and Fugaku had an argument barely a week later that ended with Obito disowned.”

That must have been some accident, Sakura thinks with a grimace. Obito's scars are definitely extensive. And between the trauma of an injury like that and being immediately disowned afterwards—his anger at Fugaku is understandable, even if the ‘willing to resort to blackmail and murder’ parts aren’t.  “And then he left town?”

“The three of us thought it was his best chance at getting a better life outside the Uchiha family,” Rin confirms, and then clarifies, “Obito and I and our friend Kakashi. We were both there when the accident happened.” Her expression shades to something that’s both fierce and sad. “Obito was saving Kakashi when he got pulled under by the riptide. He’s not as strong a swimmer as Obito and me, and he couldn’t get free. Obito got to him, and then…”

Sakura doesn’t need to ask what happened next. She’s had people die in front of her, and it’s always horrifying regardless of the circumstances. Those circumstances in particular sound especially traumatic, too. Still…

“If he really did murder those men, I have to bring him in,” she warns.

Rin tips her head in a gesture that’s only about twenty percent agreement, and doesn’t otherwise answer, and the rest of the drive passes in such heavy silence it makes Sakura's muscles wind tight. Carefully, she keeps her grip on the steering wheel as loose as she dares and doesn’t look away from the road.

 

 

“What do _you_ want?” Fugaku demands, and Sakura can't tell if the glare he gives them is meant for Rin or for her.

The expression on Rin's face is dangerously close to what Sakura would call _fight me_ , but thankfully she keeps her mouth tightly shut, even if her eyes are narrowed. Deciding not to push her luck, Sakura steps forward and offers her hand, pasting a smile on her face. “Fugaku Uchiha? I'm Sheriff Sakura Haruno. Do you have a moment to answer a few questions? It’s about your nephew.”

Irritation flickers across Fugaku's features. “Nephew? What in the world did Shisui do this time?”

Well, _that_ certainly wasn’t what Sakura was expecting to hear. She raises her brows, glancing over at Rin, but the woman looks blank. “Not that nephew,” Sakura clarifies, looking back at Fugaku. “Obito Uchiha.”

Irritation washes away to be replaced with perfect composure, one of the best poker faces Sakura has ever seen. “Obito is not my nephew,” Fugaku says, and that tone is decidedly less perfect than his blank expression, full of acid and sharp edges. “He’s not a part of this family anymore, and I certainly have nothing to do with whatever trouble he’s caused this time.”

Family drama is Sakura's least favorite thing ever, she thinks with exasperation, but doesn’t give up when Fugaku pointedly turns away, just follows him down the walkway that edges the river. “Mr. Uchiha, it’s possible that you're in danger,” she says, and it’s mostly not an exaggeration. “Have you spoken to Obito at all in the last few days?”

Fugaku casts a scathing look over his shoulder. “I've spoken to him once,” he says flatly, “outside Ino's, as you're well aware, Sheriff. He hasn’t approached me beyond that, and good riddance.”

Behind her, Rin makes a quiet, angry sound, but all she says is, “Do you know why he’s come back?”

“He seemed pretty insistent, when you talked,” Sakura agrees, watching the way Fugaku's shoulders stiffen with narrowed eyes. “What did he want back that you took from him?”

“How should I know?” Fugaku bites out. “The boy went insane after his accident. He hasn’t made an ounce of sense since. If he has some sort of grudge against me, I assure you, it’s not because of anything _I_ did.”

Whether it’s his tone, his dismissiveness, or his anger, Fugaku is putting Sakura's hackles up faster than she can remember anyone else doing in a long time. Taking a breath, she checks her temper, reminds herself that physical intimidation is _not_ a viable questioning tactic, and asks, “Mr. Uchiha, what does Obito _think_ you took from him? Do you have any idea?”

“I don’t have time to debate the possible delusions of a mad dog,” Fugaku snaps, waving away a pretty woman who approaches with a clipboard. The walkway is narrow enough that she stumbles back to let him by, high heels sinking into the grass on the bank, and Sakura catches her elbow as she wobbles. She offers Sakura a thankful smile, touching her wrist, and—

Fugaku yelps, shouts in panic. There's a loud splash, and Sakura whips around just in time to see his head disappear beneath the surface of the river with a speed that can only mean he’s being pulled.

There's no time for hesitation. Sakura dumps her jacket and holster, kicks off her boots, and dives.

The impact of the water is _cold_ , so cold her lungs feel like they're being compressed, but Sakura grits her teeth and kicks towards the stream of bubbles she can see disappearing downwards. It’s hard to see more than a few feet in front of her, the water murky, but Fugaku's shape is clear, struggling and twisting as she gets close, dragged down by his clothes and shoes and—

A hand around his ankle.

Sakura puts on as much speed as she can, diving down deeper. Fugaku startles as she arrows past him, but Sakura doesn’t have the breath for reassurance; she grabs the hand and wrenches, putting just enough strength behind it that she could break bone if she tried, and feels a surge of satisfaction as the fingers are torn away. Instantly, Fugaku kicks for the surface, but that hand twists, and the shape attached to it surges up.

Luminous eyes, that’s the first thing that strikes Sakura. Pale skin, eyes glowing red, a mouth full of long, sharp teeth like an anglerfish. The hand in Sakura's grip is scaled, fingers grotesquely long and webbed with claws on the end, and Sakura has half an instant to feel a burst of fear and horror and bewilderment before something long and snakelike and made of muscle slams into her side.

It’s like getting hit by a car, and Sakura crashes back into the earth of the bank, every ounce of air escaping from her lungs in a burst of bubbles. In the murky water, the shape twists, dark and ominous, and feathery fins flicker once before the creature goes surging up, aiming for Fugaku.

Her head is spinning, but Sakura kicks hard off the bank, following the thing up, and just manages to grab its tail as the fins sweep past. It hauls her up a few feet, then curls around, and massive teeth snap at Sakura's nose as claws snatch at her shoulder. She hauls back, puts every last bit of strength she can muster into it, and punches the creature in the face.

Dark blood explodes into the water around them, and there's a high, sharp, wavering noise. The thing goes reeling back, but Sakura's lungs are burning and she can't press her advantage. She kicks for the surface instead, dragged down by sodden jeans but desperate for air, and breaks the surface with a gasp. The air is almost hot in comparison to the water, deceptively kind, but she doesn’t let herself bask in it. Fugaku is still struggling, and she swims towards him, hooks an arm around his chest, and reaches for the bank.

A strong hand grabs hers, and with a cry of effort Rin drags them up. The other woman is there a moment later, gets a hold on Sakura's elbow and heaves, and Sakura tightens her grip on Fugaku and lets herself be pulled. They clear the water just as a dark shape passes close to the surface, as threatening as any horror-movie shark, and Sakura just catches sight of an orange-gold fin, wide and feathery like a betta fish’s tail. Then it’s gone, vanishing into the depths of the river, and Sakura hits the walk on her knees, gasping for air.

“Sheriff!” the woman says, crouching down next to her. “You’re bleeding!”

“What?” Rin sounds alarmed, and she leaves Fugaku to his own devices and drops to one knee, reaching for Sakura's shoulder.

A little surprised, Sakura glances down, and has to swallow at the sight of long, deep claw marks scored into her white shirt, already staining the fabric crimson. Four of them, just like fingers, with a puncture from a fifth claw on her bicep. They don’t hurt yet, but that’s likely down to adrenaline and the chill of the water, because Sakura is already starting to lose feeling in her fingers.

“I've got—blankets,” she gets out around a shiver that makes her teeth rattle together. “My car—”

“I’ll go,” the woman volunteers, rising to her feet. She hurries down the walk, staying as far from the river as is possible on the narrow path, and Sakura watches her leave, wary of any more creatures bursting out of the river.

“All right?” she asks Fugaku, who’s just pulling himself up.

The man looks pale and shaken, eyes wide and trained on the river. “That—” he starts, and then forces his mouth shut and nods.

He doesn’t seem to be shaking at all, standing there like he can't feel the way the wind has teeth. Maybe it’s shock, or hypothermia, but he doesn’t have any of the other signs. Sakura opens her mouth to ask about it, but before she can there are hands on the buttons of her shirt, undoing them quickly, and she squeaks.

“Sorry, Sakura,” Rin says, and has the grace to look faintly abashed. “We need to get you out of these wet clothes. I should take a look at your shoulder, too.”

Since they're not doing anything but making her colder, Sakura nods, tries to fumble a button open herself, and gives up when her fingers prove too clumsy. Rin takes over without another word, carefully tugging her shirt off. She hesitates at the undershirt, so Sakura makes the decision for her, stripping it off and dumping it next to her. From beside them, there's a sound of indignation, and Fugaku whips around to put his back to them. It makes Sakura roll her eyes, because she’s still wearing a sports bra, and it’s very unlikely that a man Fugaku's age has never seen a woman in a bra before.

Rin looks amused as well, but she just pulls Sakura's discarded jacket up over her shoulders, leaving the right one uncovered. “Do you have a first aid kit?” she asks Fugaku.

The man risks a glance back, then turns. “I believe we do,” he says, frowning.

“I got it!” The woman trots back, Sakura's emergency blankets folded over one arm and a large kit under the other. She passes the kit to Rin, then crouches down, draping one blanket over Sakura's legs. A hesitation, and then she turns to offer the other to her boss.

“Thank you, Izumi,” Fugaku says, though a grimace flickers over his face. He takes it and pulls it around himself, and Sakura doesn’t think it’s just the cold that makes the image of Fugaku wearing a blanket like a cape hilarious.

Still, the amusement takes distant second to the concern, and Sakura looks past Rin as the woman presses a disinfectant pad to her shoulder to tell the man, “Someone’s after you.”

Fugaku's eyes dart back to the water, and he scowls. “Yes, I had noticed.”

“Want to fill me in on why?” Sakura retorts, and hisses as Rin peels the pad away and replaces it with a thick layer of gauze.

Fugaku hesitates, gaze flickering from Sakura to the river and back again. “None,” he says, and it’s one of the least convincing lies Sakura has ever heard. She levels a glare at him, patience all but gone, and Fugaku grimaces. “I'm a businessman,” he tries. “A great many people would like to see me _out_ of business.”

“There's a difference between out of business and in a grave,” Sakura tells him and nods to his ankle. “You should let Rin look at that.”

With surprise, Fugaku looks down to where he’s bleeding through the hem of his pants. He pulls them up enough to see, and Sakura eyes the five long gouges where she tore the creature’s hand away. Remembers the teeth, the strength of that tail, and wonders why it didn’t just snap Fugaku's next or tear his throat out.

“I think this was a warning, Mr. Uchiha,” she says. “Next time, whoever did this isn’t going to be nearly as nice.”

Fugaku pales, taking a step away from her—away from the _water_ , calm and undisturbed as it flows past. It’s dark enough that just about anything could be lurking beneath the surface, though, and after what she saw, Sakura isn’t about to assume _anything_ about what’s in there.

She curls her fingers a little more tightly around the edge of her jacket, pulling it close. For a moment all she can see is red eyes, needle-sharp teeth in a gaping mouth, webbed hands with a predator’s claws meant to rip and hold. A shiver wracks her, and Sakura is absolutely sure that it isn’t just from the chill.

It looks like Konoha is a hell of a lot more interesting than she would have thought, and this, the monsters in the water?

This is one hell of a secret.


	5. But doth suffer a sea-change

Dragging herself into Ino's dinner feels a little like a walk of shame. Sakura is limping a little, her entire side where the creature hit her a solid mass of bruises, and her other shoulder is stinging where it clawed her. She hasn’t had a chance to stow a change of clothes in the office yet, so she’s in one of Rin's sweatshirts and Izumi’s spare skirt, which is a little smaller than Sakura would prefer when she’s still officially on the clock. It’s not the most auspicious first day on the job, that’s for certain, and after the train wreck of the morning Sakura is more than ready for a hot meal and as many cups of coffee as she can get down.

The bell above the door jingles cheerfully, and Sakura manfully resists the urge to glare up at it as she pushes through. It’s just as quiet inside as the last time she was here, though the faces have changed; Naruto and Sasuke are at a table by the window, and a pretty woman with her hair in buns is having lunch with a redheaded woman at the far end of the counter. Peaceful, Sakura thinks with some relief, and tries not to favor her leg as she makes her way to the seat she was in last time, gingerly pulling herself up.

“Just a minute, I’ll be right with you!” Ino calls from the back, bright and cheerful, and it makes Sakura smile despite herself. An instant later, Ino is ducking around the edge of the kitchen area, balancing two large plates and a pair of glasses, and when her eyes land on Sakura she grins. “Sheriff! How—oh.”

Sakura offers her a wry smile, aware that she probably looks about as terrible as possible. “Afternoon,” she says.

Blue eyes full of worry, Ino looks her over for a moment before her expression firms. “I’ll be right back,” she promises. “Hang on one second.”

“I'm not planning to go _anywhere_ ,” Sakura promises dryly, and that at least makes Ino snort.

“You’d better not,” she calls over her shoulder, carrying the plates down to the two women at the end of the bar. The redhead in glasses mutters a distracted thank you, attention mostly on her book, and the brunette giggles, waving Ino off before she reaches over and steals the book, setting it firmly on her far side as the redhead protests. Under the cover of their friendly bickering, Ino ducks away, heading for Sakura again with quick steps. As soon as she’s close enough, she leans over the counter, grabbing for Sakura's hand.

“What in the world happened?” she asks, checking Sakura's knuckles. They're a little red from punching the creature, but thankfully not too much—if nothing else, Sakura knows how to hit, and hit hard.

Sakura swallows against the feel of Ino tracing delicate fingers over her knuckles, and hopes her voice manages to be steady when she answers, “I'm surprised you haven’t heard already. Someone dragged Fugaku Uchiha into the river and tried to drown him. I pulled him out.”

Ino rolls her eyes, tossing a strand of butter-blonde hair over her shoulder. “Contrary to popular opinion, I don’t _actually_ know everything that happens in Konoha,” she says dryly. “And the Uchiha are always bad sports about gossip, anyway.” She glances up at Sakura, concern flickering across her face, and asks, “How badly did you get hurt?”

“Bruises and a couple of scratches, that’s all,” Sakura assures her, which is _technically_ the truth. “And I spent an hour sitting on top of the heater.”

With a laugh, Ino lets go, and Sakura tries not to miss the warmth of her hand. “Well, let’s see if we can take the rest of the chill off. It’s way too early in the year for swimming. Coffee?”

“You're the best,” Sakura sighs, and barely ten seconds later Ino is pressing a mug into her fingers. She takes it gladly, wrapping her fingers around the warming porcelain, and inhales the steam for a moment before allowing herself a sip. Absolute _heaven_ , without a doubt.

The light press of fingers on her arm pulls her attention back to Ino, who’s still watching her closely. “You should eat,” she says firmly. “You're getting a menu, no arguments.”

“I didn’t plan on any,” Sakura tells her, and snorts when Ino drops the menu right into her lap. “Has anyone ever told you that you're pushy?”

“Never,” Ino says sweetly, and it’s so very definitely a lie that Sakura has to laugh. She switches her coffee to one hand, setting the menu on the counter and opening it with the other. All of the options look far too tempting, and Sakura gets the feeling she’s going to be eating here a lot more often than her wallet would prefer.

“What would you recommend?” she asks.

Ino hums, and Sakura glances up to find blue eyes on her, looking her over. “I think,” she declares, “that you are in need of tomato soup and a grilled cheese sandwich.”

Sakura hadn’t even considered that as an option, but it really does sound perfect. “Sold,” she agrees, pushing her menu back to Ino. “Also, what _witchcraft_.”

Ino flashes her a showy wink. “Not witchcraft, _waitressing_ ,” she corrects cheerfully, then collects the coffee pot, refills Sakura's cup, and disappears into the back.

With a relieved sigh, Sakura relaxes into her seat, taking another mouthful of blisteringly hot coffee and savoring the feel as it slides down through her chest, banishing the last traces of the cold. With a quiet place to sit, with the promise of food on the way, it’s easy enough to let her muscles unwind, and she just breathes for a moment.

Not long enough, given the way memories of the creature in the river filter back.

Sakura's fingers tighten around the mug, and she tries not to grimace too obviously, even though all she’s wanted to do since she first came up for air is curse long and loud. Konoha was supposed to be her chance to get _away_ from things, to find a place without dark undercurrents and massive secrets. And this?

This is just as bad as stumbling into those cage fights in her last case before the transfer.

There's a faint creak from the handle of the mug, and Sakura immediately loosens her grip with a wince. It’s been almost a month since the last time she broke a dish, and she really doesn’t want to add to her crockery body count, which is already way too high. She forces herself to breathe, to keep a hold of her temper, and closes her eyes, willing her hands not to shake. They're generally steady, but she was just almost _eaten_ by a _fish._ A little reaction now that Rin's worried eyes aren’t on her is allowed, she’s pretty certain.

Those teeth flicker through her mind again, snapping shut like a bear trap full of needles inches from her face, and she sighs, rubbing the bridge of her nose. Murderous fish. Just what the day needed. And, given those teeth, maybe even what dismembered Zori on the beach this morning—high tide might have been plenty high enough for it to get close enough to grab him.

Which means that someone is either working with Obito or they're gunning for Fugaku as well. With that stellar personality of his, Sakura can't even begin to imagine why.

It also, of course, leaves her with the question of how the hell she’s going to write up this encounter, because there's no way she’s putting _attacked by a monster-fish with teeth and claws_ down on the incident report. But it will look—well, _fishy_ if she says it was done by a human. Maybe claiming a scuba diver with some kind of reinforced gloves?

The clatter of dishes being set down in front of her startles Sakura from her thoughts, and she looks up into Ino's smile as the other woman brandishes the coffee pot again. “Top you off?” she offers.

Surprised, Sakura glances down to find her mug almost empty. With a snort she holds it out, and then says, “I met your mechanic. He seems pretty busy just keeping Sai's cars running, honestly.”

“You ran into Shikamaru?” Ino chuckles, sets the pot back on the warmer, and with an assessing glance over her other customers settles herself across from Sakura, leaning her elbows on the counter. “Yeah, Sai's hard on cars. I can't remember the last time he went more than a few weeks without killing one. Last year he somehow caught one on fire in the grocery store parking lot.”

Sakura winces. She hadn’t thought it was that bad, but that’s—really terrible, honestly. Making a mental note to keep Sai as far away from her jeep as possible, she tugs her meal towards her and takes her first spoonful of soup, then groans.

“Good?” Ino is smiling gently, clearly pleased. “It’s Choji’s specialty, and one of my favorites.” A pause, and then she asks, “Do you have any ideas about the murder at the Landing?”

Thinking of the shark-tooth necklace, Sakura restrains a wince. “A few,” she says vaguely, not about to bring up the fact that Obito is currently their biggest suspect. And then, as the connection strikes her, she asks, “Did you see two men come through here yesterday? Strangers, one dark-haired with a goatee and an eyepatch, the other blond, looks like a creeper with tear-track tattoos under his eyes?”

“Yeah, I saw them,” Ino confirms almost instantly. She draws a looping line on the counter between them. “Goatee guy had a tattoo like this under his collar—I kept seeing it when he moved. They sat at the table in the back, ordered coffee and burgers.” Her nose wrinkles a little. “And they didn’t tip at all.”

Sakura's willing to bet that made them memorable to their waitress, especially in a small town. “Did they talk about anything? Mention plans?”

Ino hesitates, frowning. “They were complaining about the lack of motels,” she offers. “When they asked, I told them the only one in town was Kotetsu and Izumo’s bed and breakfast, but I'm not sure if they went there.”

A place to stay is a good lead. Sakura reaches for her notebook to write down the address, but halfway there and Ino catches her hand.

“Don’t even think about it, Sheriff,” the blonde warns, humor in her face. “Finish your food, and by the time you're done I’ll be off shift. I can take you there myself.”

Sakura rolls her eyes, but lets Ino pull her hand back to the counter. “ _Pushy_ ,” she repeats, but obediently takes a bite of her sandwich. And then three more, because it’s _amazing_. “Choji is the _best_ ,” she says, possibly around a mouthful.

There's a laugh from the back, and a handsome man with bushy brown hair tied back by a bandana leans out from behind one of the stations. There's a faint flush in his cheeks as he gives Sakura a wave in thanks, and she smiles back.

“He’s definitely the best,” Ino agrees, turning to give him a wink. “Even if he refuses to marry me, the cad.”

“You only love me for my food,” Choji says patiently, though his expression is amused. “I'm holding out for someone who can appreciate my other qualities as well.”

“I appreciate your other qualities!” Ino protests huffily, flipping her hair over her shoulder.

“If you could chain me to the stove back here, you would.”

“That’s entirely beside the point.”

“Not to _me_!”

Sakura laughs, because this argument feels like an old one. She eats as she watches them harass each other, and it feels—well. Friendly. Homey. It’s a little too soon, but Sakura is pretty sure she could happily stay right here for a very long time.

Of course, her cell chooses that moment to ring loudly, and Sakura strangles a groan, washes down her bite of sandwich with the last spoonful of soup, and pulls it out of her pocket. “Haruno.”

“Sorry to interrupt your lunch, Sakura,” Rin says, sounding entirely apologetic. “We’ve got a 415 south of town.” She rattles off the address, then adds, “The neighbor, Kiba, said his dogs were going nuts and he heard shouting and things breaking. He’s got the dogs we use when we need them, so he’ll meet you at the end of the driveway.”

“On my way,” Sakura confirms, scribbling down the place on the edge of a napkin, and doesn’t let herself sigh. A disturbance. Well, with any luck it won't be anything too messy, though with the way things are going today she doesn’t have high hopes.

She slides off the stool with a faint wince, offers Ino a quick smile as she sets a twenty on the counter, and says, “Thanks for the food and the coffee. Much appreciated.”

Instantly Ino pushes the money back to her. “Lunch is on me, Sheriff. Call it a perk of the job.” She smiles back, even though her eyes are worried. “Stay safe.”

“I’ll try,” Sakura promises as lightly as she can manage, and heads for the door at a jog, already pulling out her keys.

 

 

The driveway is entirely unmarked, and Sakura would probably miss it if not for the scruffy-looking man she saw in the diner the other day standing at the edge of the road. There's a massive white-and-brown dog with him, one of the biggest Sakura has ever seen, and when she pulls off the man immediately heads for her window.

“Kiba Inuzuka,” he says, though the grin he offers is a little tight. “Shit’s quieted down now, but it sounded like a small war was happening.”

The dog rumbles what sounds like an agreement.

“You're technically the canine unit?” Sakura asks.

“Contracted out, but yeah,” Kiba confirms. He hooks a thumb at her passenger seat. “Want me an’ Akamaru to ride along? We’re pretty decent backup.”

Sakura hesitates, but…local guides are always useful. “Sure, hop in. I think he’ll fit in the back.”

Kiba lets out a laugh that sounds more like a bark. “He’s smaller than he looks. It’s the hair. Akamaru, let’s go.”

The dog leaps lightly into the back seat and squishes himself onto the bench, while Kiba pulls himself into the passenger seat. Sakura barely waits for them to get settled before she puts the car into gear, heading down the long, rutted, and mostly overgrown driveway.

“What exactly did you hear?” she asks, scanning the copse of trees ahead of them. They're a good ways from both the river and the ocean, and the fields on either side of the path are mostly grey winter grasses edged with stands of trees.

“Screaming,” Kiba answers. “Probably at least one guy, but at that pitch it’s kinda hard to tell. And then a crash like a house falling down and a couple of gunshots. Before that I was going to go over and just check it out myself, but I don’t carry. Figured it was best left to you.”

“Smart,” Sakura says distractedly, slowing as they near a bend in the road. The trees block the view on either side, and for a moment she debates getting out and approaching on foot, but if whoever’s over there is armed, she isn’t sure she wants to risk it. Not that her jeep is all that much better as an alternative. Still, it’s at least some cover, so she pulls carefully around the turn, scanning the open space at the end of the drive. A small farmhouse, a bare garden, and a car parked out front, though she doesn’t see any sign of people. Then the trees give way to open ground, and she sees smoke.

Beside her, Kiba goes tense and alert, and he’s got a hand on the door before she even starts to come to a stop. He swings out, grabs the rear door, and orders, “Out, Akamaru. Let’s work.”

The big dog leaps out as Sakura shuts off the engine, and she undoes the strap on her holster and follows quickly, waving Kiba back a step.

“Konoha police,” she calls, pitching her voice to carry. “Anyone here?”

There's no answer, and with a frown she heads for the narrow, lazy coil of smoke, fast but cautious. The house is dark, shutters closed, and it doesn’t look like the car’s been moved in a few days. The entire place is silent now, eerily so, and she scans the area carefully but doesn’t see any sign of life.

“There was a truck parked there,” Kiba murmurs, just loud enough for her to hear. When she glances at him, he tips his head towards the place where the other car is parked. “Ground’s got a dry patch in the right shape. Recently moved, I’d guess.”

Sakura grimaces. Fleeing the scene, or just taking themselves to the clinic? “You know who lives here?” she asks.

Kiba's smile is all teeth. “It’s supposed to be vacant. Up for sale.”

That certainly adds a fun twist. Sakura narrows her eyes, minding the sound of her steps as she edges around the corner of the house, and then curses. There's a small outbuilding that’s looking a hell of a lot worse for wear, beams shattered, half the roof caved in. A radiant heater is on its side near a pile of dead leaves that are the source of the smoke, and Sakura hurries over to them, righting it with her boot and then kicking dirt over the smoldering deadfall.

“Well, that could have been messy,” Kiba says lightly, though his eyes are sharp. He clicks his tongue and Akamaru picks his head up, ears pricking. “Anyone around, boy?”

Akamaru drops his nose to the ground, turning a few tight circles, and then trots over to the ruined building, keeping to the edges. In front of a piece of tin from the roof, he stops and barks once, sharply.

“There we go,” Kiba murmurs, glancing over at Sakura. She draws her gun, tipping her chin in agreement, and he heads for the dog, crouching down as Sakura covers him. The corner of sheeting comes up easily enough, lightweight and flexible, and Kiba makes a short, unhappy sound at what he finds. “This guy’s definitely gone,” he says, leaning forward, and Sakura steps to the side to take a look.

There's no question that Kiba's right. The man there is missing half his face, and Sakura's seen enough to recognize the results of a shotgun blast from up close.

“Fuck,” she mutters, pulling out her phone. She sends Rin a text telling her to send the ambulance, prepped for at least one dead body, and then crouches down to get the details. “For a small town, you sure have a lot of corpses piling up,” she says.

Kiba makes a sound of rough agreement, pointing to the man’s arm. “Those are some fucking big teeth,” he says. “Double rows, like a shark.”

Sakura's hardly an expert on bites—before Konoha the worst she’d dealt with was the occasional dog bite and a couple of perps who thought they could take her by surprise—but she’s willing to bet a month’s salary that this is something entirely different from whatever killed Waraji and Zori. There’s a hell of a lot more tearing here, and instead of needle-like stabs, whatever did this has _big_ teeth, wide and sharp.

“Unless whoever did this is carrying a shark around as a murder weapon, there has to be another answer,” she says dryly. “Seen anything like it before?”

Kiba shakes his head. “Just sharks,” he offers. “And with that out of the running, I haven’t got a damn clue.”

So much for the hope that there's some kind of wild animal running around. Sakura pushes to her feet, then turns to eye the mostly-standing section of the shop. “What are the chances that there's another body under there, you think?”

With a huff, Kiba glances over at Akamaru, who whines and dips his head, then barks. Nodding like he understood that, Kiba says, “At least one more. Akamaru can smell ‘em. No idea what kind of state they're in, though.”

It’s stupid to even contemplate crawling through a half-collapsed building, but Sakura hesitates anyway, scanning the interior. Too dark to see much, between the shadows and the overcast day, and the person who’s in there could be dead, but they could also be alive. The fire department will take at least another twenty minutes to get here if she calls them now, and Sakura isn’t going to wait that long when she’s already standing here and willing to help.

Pulling her flashlight from her belt, she clicks it on and trains the beam inside the building. Nothing immediately visible, but that’s hardly a surprise. “All right, when the ambulance gets here—”

“Nice try,” Kiba says wryly. “We’re going in with you. Ino’d never let me live it down if you got killed on my watch. And besides, how’re you going to fight the shark-wielding murderer? _Alone_?”

Sakura pauses, eyeing him unhappily, but the set of his mouth as he stares right back at her says this isn’t even _slightly_ up for debate.

“Fine,” she concedes with a grimace. “But stick close to me, and if I tell you to get out, you do it.”

“Yes ma’am,” Kiba agrees easily, tipping a salute her direction. He rises smoothly, and without so much as a word Akamaru presses up against his leg, quiet but alert. Sakura looks them over, and as little as she likes this, she’s more than willing to admit that she could so far worse where backup is concerned, and has.

Taking a breath, she steps underneath the sharply tilted roof, sweeping the beam of her flashlight across the floor. The area to her left is completely impassible, caved in and barricaded by a fallen beam, but ahead and to the right is mostly open. It’s enough for Sakura to make out a cot along the far wall, a folding chair beside it. There's a discarded shotgun on the ground, the barrel bent at an angle that looks to clean to have happened because of the collapsing roof, and she studies it for a moment, gauging the kind of strength required to do that.

It's a hell of a lot more than she would like.

“Sheriff,” Kiba says quietly, and when she glances over at him he points at the floor near his feet. Obligingly, Sakura shifts the light, and—

“That’s a lot of blood,” she murmurs, sidestepping the pool, so recent it’s still wet. There are drops scattered thick across the cement, leading deeper into the shed, and she ducks carefully under a slanted beam as she follows them. This close to the collapsed part, it’s harder to see, splintered timber edging her field of vision, but she slides around it as best she can, following the blood trail.

It comes to a halt right in front of a support post that’s miraculously still intact, and Sakura's breath catches in her throat at the sight of massive chains, looped tightly around the wood.

“Fuck,” Kiba mutters from behind her, and Akamaru whines in agreement. “What the hell were they tying up, a _bear_?”

“A bear carrying a shark would definitely be the weirdest murder I've ever seen,” Sakura says distractedly, crouching down. There's more blood on the chains themselves, and they look like they used to be secured with a padlock as big as her hand, now lying off to the side. She nudges it with the flashlight just enough to turn it, and then grimaces. “But I don’t think bears usually pick their locks.”

Kiba makes a sound of agreement. “If this is where the blood trail starts, Akamaru an’ I can track where it leads,” he says. “If that’s all right with you.”

“Thanks, Inuzuka,” Sakura agrees. “I’ll keep looking for our body.”

“Have fun.” Kiba turns and trots out of the shop, Akamaru next to him with his nose to the ground. Sakura doesn’t watch them go, but steps deeper into the building, scanning for survivors.

All she finds is a man, clearly dead, pinned by a fallen shelf, with his neck twisted at an unnatural angle.

For a moment, Sakura thinks about cursing. Thinks about trying to get him out, because that seems like the least she can do. But the wall is half-collapsed on top of him, and she can't risk shifting it when there's clearly no chance he’s alive.

Taking a breath, she shoves her hair back, closes her eyes, and forces herself to focus.

At least four bodies, in two different places, all in one day. Konoha's racking up a body count as fast as any big city she’s ever been in.

“Hey, Sheriff, we got something!” Kiba calls.

That sounds like it’s right outside the back wall. With a flicker of surprise, Sakura heads back out, picking her way carefully through the rubble and breaking into a jog as soon as she’s clear. As she rounds the back, she slows, because Kiba is crouched next to a piece of metal in the dirt, one hand in Akamaru's fur to brace himself.

“What is it?” she asks, and then stops short as she realizes, sucking in a breath.

Kiba gives her a crooked smile. “Best way to knock out a bear, right?” he jokes, though it falls flat. “A crowbar’s my preferred method, too.”

Sakura grimaces, leaning over to check the pool of darkened earth—blood, without a doubt. “There’s hair on it,” she says. Black hair, a little longer than average for a man and shorter than average for a woman, clinging to the wedge-end of the crowbar where it lies abandoned next to the bloody ground.

“And drag marks,” Kiba offers, pointing. Big marks, wide and deep—whoever was being dragged was likely tall and heavy. “They head back towards the front. What do you want to bet whoever it was they were knocking out got tossed in the truck that left?”

“I don’t take sucker bets,” Sakura retorts, straightening. She takes in the whole scene, feeling a grimace pulling at her mouth. “So whoever they're holding in the shed gets loose, causes a commotion, and kills at least one of them. Then they knock the captive out with a crowbar and drag him away to take him…somewhere. Probably not for a manicure.”

Kiba lets out a bark of laughter. “With the size of those chains they had on him? Probably not. I didn’t see anyone leaving, though, so if they drove out of here, it probably wasn’t along the main road. There’re about ten tracks that lead up into the mountains at the back of this property, and all of ‘em come out in different places. Not many people up there to see them, either.”

“Fantastic,” Sakura mutters, and has never meant anything less.


	6. Into something rich and strange

There are, Sakura thinks a little grimly, far too many pieces scattered in front of her right now, to the point that she can't even tell if they're all from the same puzzle or not. She wants to say they are, because that would make her life a hell of a lot easier, but at this point she isn’t even sure of that much.

“Nothing here,” Kiba tells her, sounding on the edge of pissed as he scowls at the road in front of them. “I can't tell anything, sorry. They must have been using this path for a while—the tracks go everywhere.”

Sakura doesn’t need to be skilled at tracking to see that. The dirt road is deeply rutted, and the wear looks frequent. Some of the tracks lead off into a stretch of forest, some head towards the ocean, and even more lead up into the mountains. There's no telling which route the people from the farm took when they jumped ship. Not only that, but Kiba never saw them, so he can't tell her what kind of truck they were driving, either.

“I should go check with Rin,” she says, and tries not to let it sound too tired. It’s been a long day already, and it’s not even two in the afternoon yet.

Kiba hums, light and agreeable, and crouches down to scratch Akamaru's chest. “Lots happening,” he says easily.

Sakura snorts, because that’s putting it mildly. “I feel like someone upended a couple of jigsaw puzzles over my head,” she admits, because if she doesn’t she’s going to punch a tree, and that will definitely raise a few eyebrows. Not the right kind, unfortunately.

With a low chuckle, Kiba pushes to his feet. “Shino likes those things,” he says, pulling a face. “Especially the massive ones with thousands of pieces and, like, greyscale pictures and shit. I’d probably gnaw my own hand off out of boredom, but he does them and frames them. Likes to start with the most obvious pieces first, and then work from there.”

A little startled, Sakura casts him a glance, and can't help but smile. “Thanks,” she says, and means it fully. It’s good advice, and a needed reminder; stressing over fragments won't help her figure his out, and usually she knows that. This is just…a little overwhelming, taken all together.

Kiba grins at her, and there are a lot of teeth but she’s pretty sure it’s not meant to be anything other than friendly. “Anytime, Sheriff. If we’re done here, I’ll head home and see if my sister wants to take her pack up the trails a ways, check that nothing’s happening up in the hills. A group of us together might find more than just me an’ Akamaru. I’ll call you if we make any headway.”

“That would be perfect,” Sakura says with some relief, and tips her head at her jeep. “Can I give you a ride back?”

“Akamaru will never say no to a car ride, no matter how short. Right, dude?” Kiba asks his dog, and Akamaru wags his tail and barks once, like he’s agreeing. Sakura smiles at them and doesn’t have to force it, despite the mess this whole situation has turned into.

 

 

Sakura watches Kiba head down the road, and once he’s out of sight she leans back in her seat, tips her head, and groans. Early retirement is starting to look a hell of a lot more appealing.

Except Sakura knows herself, and knows she’d go absolutely insane before she hit the end of the first week of idleness. And no other job would come close to being satisfying after this one.

She has the pieces she needs, technically. Or at least _enough_ of them. Obito is the big question here, and he’s at least vaguely involved in two of the three problems that have cropped up—first in the murder at the Landing, where his necklace ended up at the scene, and then in the case of someone trying to drown Fugaku, because that threat he made was clear enough to count in Sakura's book. Before she does anything else, she needs to start trying to find Obito. Maybe Rin will have a list of places he’s stayed before, or Ino, with her definite knowledge of _something_ that’s happening, will have some idea of where he’s holed up.

Second on the list is finding out why Zori and Waraji were in town. That, at least, is a problem Sakura can tackle immediately—Ino sent them to the only inn in Konoha, and since it didn’t look like anyone was sleeping in the truck, Sakura is willing to bet they ended up there.

Still, there's one lead she can chase down without moving more than her fingers, and it’s directly related to whatever tried to drown Fugaku. It’s not going to be fun, that’s for certain, but she’d best get it over with before she ends up in the water with the thing again.

With a sigh, she drags her fingers through her hair, shoves it back behind her ears, and reaches for her phone.

It takes her another minute of staring at the blank screen to find the willpower to unlock it, and then another solid two minutes to pull up her contacts. She wavers even then, not entirely sure if she has the wherewithal to suffer through a conversation with an ex, but decides she’d rather deal with a former partner than go into things unprepared.

She opens up a new text, hopes that her number hasn’t been blocked, and steels herself for the possibility of unpleasantness.

_What has teeth like an anglerfish, twelve feet of tail, big red eyes, and likes to drown people?_

Given the fact that their mutually busy lives were part of the reason they broke up in the first place, Sakura doesn’t expect any sort of prompt reply. So it’s entirely a surprise that her phone vibrates just as she’s putting it away, barely ten seconds after she hits send. Brows rising, she pulls it back out, eyeing the screen.

**The real world’s utterly disappointing take on Ariel.**

Sakura stares at the words, checks that the texted the right number, triple-checks that she read the answer right, and sends back, _You're fucking with me_. _There's no way that was a mermaid._

There's barely a pause. **Whatever you're thinking it should be, I can guarantee that’s a siren. Mers are different.**

Temari's penchant for understatement hasn’t changed a bit. Sakura rolls her eyes. _I noticed. The only way that thing could lure sailors into the depths would be with the promise of killing it._

**Did it bite you?**

_No. Is that something to avoid? Will I turn into a werefish? Start craving human flesh?_

There's a long, long pause. **I think I'm remembering why we broke up. Yes it’s something to avoid, because they have big fucking teeth and it’ll hurt.**

Sakura just barely refrains herself from rolling her eyes again. She likes to set a daily limit for herself, and with Temari she’s practically guaranteed to use up her quota if she doesn’t restrain herself.

Still, that was something almost like concern, and it’s probably as close to an olive branch as there’s going to be between them. Sakura would be an idiot not to take it. She starts a message, pauses, erases it, and tries again.

_It tossed me around with its tail a bit but I’m okay. Tried to drown a local businessman, though._

**You were in the WATER with it?**

_It’s not like I had a CHOICE, he was DROWNING._

Temari sends her a sparkling crown, and Sakura knows her well enough to recognize her ‘congratulations, you’re king of the idiots’ response, which is usually reserved for Kankuro. She sends a passive-aggressive smiley in return, and then asks, _Intelligent?_

 **More than you, apparently** , is Temari's biting response, but just as Sakura is contemplating tossing her phone out the window in a huff she adds, **Human-level, plus extra cunning. Businessman a polluter? That would make them want to eat him.**

Sakura honestly wouldn’t put it past Fugaku to be doing something like that. _Maybe. That was the first attack I know about._

Another long pause, and then Temari asks, **Where in the world are you?**

This time it’s Sakura who hesitates, but…Temari's level-headed, almost to a fault. She’s not going to do anything rash. _Fire Country. Konoha, about six hours north of Port City._

**I've never heard of it.**

Those five words all but radiate suspicion, which is a good fraction of the remaining reason she and Sakura broke up. Too similar, at the end of the day, and never able to let their jobs go.

_I'm the sheriff now. Small town._

**My favorite. Text when you need my help.**

No question in her mind, of course, that Sakura _will_ end up needing it, and that’s vaguely irritating in a way it probably shouldn’t be. Sakura huffs at her phone, then shoves it into her pocket, hoping a non-answer will be pointed enough in response.

Still. At least she has some idea what she’s dealing with here, even if it’s not massively helpful.

Mermaids. She’s dealing with _mermaids_.

Well. Apparently the universe is making up for the abundance of pretty people in Konoha with monstrous, flesh-eating mermaids instead of lovely, seductive sirens. Sakura can't say she really approves of the trade.

“Maybe I should reconsider retirement,” she tells the steering wheel. “I wouldn’t have to sit around doing nothing all the time. I could learn to knit. Or crochet. That’s a thing normal people do, right?”

The steering wheel doesn’t answer, which is honestly probably a good thing. With a groan, Sakura presses the heels of her palms against her eyes, focuses on breathing evenly, and then pulls her phone out again.

Rin picks up on the second ring. “Sakura,” she says, sounding vaguely apologetic. “Tsunade hasn’t gotten back to me yet with the autopsy results—”

“That’s fine,” Sakura assures her. “I was actually calling to ask if you knew the owners of the inn.”

“You mean Kotetsu and Izumo’s bed and breakfast? Of course.” There's a smile in her voice as she adds, “Small town.”

Sakura smiles wryly. “Smaller than I keep expecting. Can you tell me the address? I'm going to check whether Zori and Waraji were staying there.”

After a second of hesitation, Rin offers, “I don’t remember the exact street address, but if you take the main road south out of town, it will be the second street on your left once you pass city limits. The bed and breakfast is about half a mile down, on the right. You can't miss it.”

Well, that seems easy enough to find. Sakura doesn’t bother writing it down, just turns into the street and heads back towards Konoha. “Thanks. I also need to know if there's anywhere Obito would go now that he’s in town. Houses, rentals, friends, anything. We need to find him.”

This time the pause is a lot less happy, but after a moment Rin breathes out a quiet sigh. “I’ll make some calls. Most of our friends from high school still live close enough to be options. Give me a few hours.”

No argument, even if Sakura was bracing herself for one. She sends up a quiet thanks to whatever deity looks sheriffs that Rin didn’t make this a problem, and says, “Thank you, Rin. I appreciate it.”

“I should have started when you IDed the necklace,” Rin says wryly. “So don’t thank me. I just—keep hoping he’s not involved. It’s silly.”

“He’s your friend.” Sakura tries to keep the reluctant sympathy out of her voice, but—she knows all too well what conflicts of interest are like. Temari might have been her first real experience with it, but that was one hell of a learning curve. “I’ll be back once I've cleared the inn.”

“Hopefully I’ll have something for you by then. Good luck, Sakura.”

“Thanks, Rin. You too.” Sakura hangs up and sets her phone aside, focusing on the drive. Hopefully Kotetsu and Izumo will be just as helpful as most of the people she’s encountered so far, because she could definitely use a break at this point.

 

 

“You’re _sure_?” Kotetsu asks, sounding faintly stressed. He squints at his laptop again, then over at the pair of mug shots Sakura provided. “I mean, that’s them, but they said their names were…” He trails off, scrubbing a hand through his wild hair, and groans. “Fake, obviously. I'm so sorry, Sheriff. I didn’t think—”

“Most people don’t,” Sakura says soothingly, because Kotetsu looks like he’s about to vibrate out of his own skin. “I'm sorry for the trouble, Mr. Hagane, and for the alarm, but I do need to check their rooms.”

“Just the one room,” Kotetsu corrects, but he willingly grabs a key from the hand-carved wooden rack behind the desk and slips around to lead her out a set of frosted french doors and into a neatly-kept garden. “We only have three bungalows in total, but we have a long-term guest in one and the other is still closed from winter. It gets too drafty to rent out.” He casts a look at the pale grey cottage that sits right at the edge of the sand, but turns away to the dark blue one that’s standing off to the left. “They weren’t happy about sharing, but they took it, and they said they didn’t want breakfast delivered so we didn’t even think to check—”

Sakura cuts off the rambling with a hand on his elbow. “There wouldn’t have been any reason for you to check. If you're willing to give me the key, I can take it from here.”

For a moment she thinks Kotetsu is going to protest, but he casts another look at the cottage and then nods. “That’s fine, Sheriff. I should—Izumo should be getting back from his deliveries soon, I need to tell him what happened.”

“Probably a good idea,” Sakura agrees, accepting the key he passes her. She waits a minute more, until he’s passed back into the house and out of sight, and then blows out a short breath, shoves her hair back behind her ears, and makes a mental note to start carrying a spare hairband in her jeep. The one she started out today wearing is somewhere in the river, and it’s bothering her more than it should.

The windows are dark, but Sakura circles the building once, wary of any movement inside; it’s not inconceivable that Zori and Waraji could have someone else helping them, even if Kotetsu said he only saw two people in the truck. There's no sign of movement, though, and when Sakura cautiously unlocks the door, it swings open without a sound. Easy to tell at a glance that the place is unoccupied—there isn’t even a closet for someone to hide in, not unless they locked themselves in the trunk at the foot of the king-sized bed. Sakura gives it a wary look, but there's a battered backpack on top of it, so she’s willing to bet there's no one inside. Nothing as helpful as a nametag hanging in plain sight, but Sakura pulls on a pair of gloves and carefully checks it anyway.

The wallet in the front pocket holds a driver’s license for Waraji, along with far more cash than one man would reasonably be expected to carry. At least seven hundred in large bills, Sakura thinks, checking it over with a frown, and another three hundred in smaller bills. Not counterfeit, Sakura is fairly sure, though she’s hardly an expert. And—maybe it’s not an inherently suspicious thing, to have that much money with him, but Sakura doesn’t like it. Put it together with criminal pasts and their armed presence on a beach in the middle of the night and it’s _incredibly_ suspicious.

Frown deepening, Sakura checks the other pockets, finds a shaving kit in one and a toothbrush in another, then pulls a phone out of the top pocket. It comes to life when she hits the button, and Sakura raises a brow when she realizes there's no lock. A simple swipe of her thumb opens it, and it chimes cheerily, immediately bringing up the navigation app. Directions from Konoha to Tanzaku Gai are open, and Sakura tries to remember why that name feels meaningful even as she checks the history. Nothing of use, it looks like, so they either knew how to get to Konoha already or they had some other sort of directions on the way here. Given Sakura's own experience with her GPS system’s apparent refusal to acknowledge Konoha's existence, it probably served them better.

Or maybe not, given that Zori and Waraji are both currently in the morgue, and Zori at least is in pieces.

Grimacing a little at that train of thought, Sakura switches over to the call log, but none of the incoming numbers have a name attached except for Zori’s. Sakura studies the most recent calls for a moment, mentally checking off three with a Port City area code. There's another with a code she doesn’t recognize off the top of her head, but the last one…

That’s a Konoha area code, she’d bet anything on it.

For a moment she considers just calling it, but that’s her recklessness talking. With a wry smile at herself, Sakura retrieves her own phone, then texts Rin the Konoha number and the unfamiliar one and asks her to look them up. There's no immediate answer, so Sakura checks the text log, finds nothing but complaining between Zori and Waraji about gas station food, and sets the phone aside. Inside the bag there's a single change of clothes, a heavy hunting knife, and a plain envelope with even more cash in it. At least another five thousand, Sakura thinks, feeling her brows rise. There's no _way_ for that to be anything other than really fucking suspicious, and she doesn’t like this _at all_.

Zori and Waraji were on the beach at high tide, with Obito, and there was some kind of fight. _Something_ killed them, probably the same something that then tried to kill Fugaku a few hours later. Fugaku and Obito were engaged in some kind of feud that goes back years, which even Obito's best friend doesn’t know the cause of, and Obito threatened Fugaku, gave him a time limit of high tide—

Her phone chimes, and Sakura snatches it up, accepting the call. “Haruno.”

“I traced the numbers you sent me,” Rin tells her without preamble. “One is registered to a prepaid cell phone from Grass Country, and…”

Well, _that’s_ not a good sign, if Rin doesn’t even want to say it. Sakura goes to rub the bridge of her nose, remembers at the last second that she’s wearing gloves, and aborts the motion with a groan. “Rin? Just—spit it out. It can't be that bad, right?”

Rin huffs a laugh. “I guess that depends on your definition of _bad_ ,” she says. “It’s Fugaku Uchiha’s number.”

Well, Sakura thinks, rocking back on her heels. That’s…startling. And ominously apt, somehow. She taps her knuckles against her knee, chews her lip for a moment, and then says dryly, “My first chance to use the interrogation room, yay. Wait. _Is_ there an interrogation room in the office?”

“Mizuki had the basement set up,” Rin confirms, though she sounds amused as well. “Should I ask Fugaku to come in, or do you want to pick him up?”

“Ask him to come in,” Sakura tells her, pauses, and adds, “And start a pot of coffee, if you don’t mind. I can at least pretend this is just a friendly round of questions.”

Rin snorts. “Nothing involving Fugaku is ever friendly,” she huffs, just loudly enough for Sakura to catch it, and then raises her voice back to normal. “No dead bodies this time? I think Tsunade's started carrying her phone with her, after the two calls today.”

Sakura rolls her eyes. “Not _yet_ ,” she says. “Let’s hold off on absolutes until we close up the office for the night.”

That, at least, makes Rin laugh. “Are you bringing me more evidence?” she asks.

“Zori and Waraji’s bags, since they left them in the room,” Sakura confirms. “I've only checked Waraji’s so far, but it looks like there's at least a couple thousand in cash here. If Zori’s has anywhere close to the same, I think we can probably assume someone was paying them for something under the table.”

“The kind of something that put them on a beach at four in the morning with a shotgun?” Rin says dryly, and there's a creak in the background, like she turned in her office chair. “Oh, I checked the prints on the lock you brought me—they were Zori’s. And I called Shikamaru to get the truck towed to my lab as soon as possible. There might be something there that wasn’t obvious from the outside.”

Well, that’s at least one more piece of the puzzle put into place, Sakura tells herself. Now just a few hundred more to go. “Thanks, Rin. I’ll finish up here and be on my way in a few minutes. There's not much beyond the bags.”

“All right,” Rin agrees cheerfully. “I’ll keep you updated.”

Sakura smiles a little as she hangs up, glad Rin's mood has improved at least a bit. Hers isn’t all that much worse, really; having definite contact between Waraji and Zori and someone who’s already involved in the case makes her happy. Maybe Fugaku was a target, or maybe the Uchiha family as a whole is, if Sakura's been looking at this wrong. They could have caught Obito on the beach, waiting for his uncle. If he got away, the mer—since there's no way in hell she’s calling that thing a mermaid, not after her childhood love affair with Ariel—could have gone after Fugaku as the next best target. The phone calls—they could have arranged a meeting with the man, or something like that. Trying to make their jobs easier. Maybe the mer has the same goal and took out Zori and Waraji as competition.

It’s not a lot to go on, not yet, but it’s a good start.

Pushing to her feet, she does a quick check of the rest of the room, including under the bed and in the closet-sized bathroom. There's barely any evidence of habitation, though—clearly the men were in and out quickly, with barely enough time to sleep. She can't find another bag, which is a bit aggravating, but it’s possible that Zori stashed his in their truck, since they didn’t seem to be trying all that hard to keep things anonymous.

Then again, Sakura is pretty sure that no one was quite aware of the exact date she was going to start as sheriff. And between that and Mizuki’s disappearance, that’s a big open invitation for criminals to get away with things.

Sakura checks the room twice more, just to be certain she didn’t miss anything, but comes up emptyhanded beyond the bag. She takes it carefully, then steps out of the cabin, closing and locking the door behind her. If Rin gets a moment between all the other crime scenes she has to process, Sakura will send her over to check this one, but it might be a day or two.

When she knocks lightly on the frosted glass doors, it’s not Kotetsu who opens them, but a taller man with brown hair under a bandana. He gives Sakura a faintly worried smile as he steps back to let her in. “Sheriff Haruno. I'm sorry I wasn’t here earlier. I'm Izumo Kamizuki, Kotetsu’s partner.”

“It’s nice to meet you,” Sakura tells him, shaking his hand. Like Kotetsu, he has several burn scars on his arms, and a few thin knife scars on his fingers—they're bakers, Kotetsu had said. Most of the stores in Konoha sell their pastries. “I hope it won't be too much of an inconvenience, but do you think you can keep that room closed up for a few days? Just until I can get Rin out here.”

“Of course. We don’t have anyone checking in until next week, anyway.” Relief bleeds into Izumo’s expression. “There weren’t any bodies, were there?”

“Just one of the men’s bags,” Sakura assures him, and wonders if that question is a reflection on Konoha in general or just her short tenure as sheriff. She hopes it’s not either one, honestly, or retirement is really going to start looking more appealing.

“Thank fuck,” Kotetsu mutters, coming down the stairs. When Izumo shoots him a reproving look, he holds his hands up in defense. “What? You were thinking it!”

“That doesn’t mean you should actually _say_ it!” Izumo retorts.

Sakura smothers a laugh. “I’ll get out of your hair, gentlemen. Thank you for the help.”

Kotetsu grins at her. “It’s our pleasure, Sheriff. Especially when bodies aren’t involved.”

It takes effort for Sakura not to roll her eyes. “Why do I get the feeling I'm gaining a reputation?” she asks, and hopes it isn’t quite as plaintive as it sounds.

Izumo offers a sympathetic smile. “It’s a small town, Sheriff. First impressions tend to stick.”

Well, as long as this impression ends with her successfully doing her job, Sakura supposes she can live with it.


	7. Come unto these yellow sands

Sakura intends to drive right past the station on her way back to the shipping yard, but when she reaches it Rin is standing on the sidewalk, the robin’s egg blue of her oversized cardigan vivid against the grey of the town. As soon as Rin spots the jeep, she flags Sakura down, and Sakura quickly pulls over, unlocking her doors. Rin is frowning, which isn't a good sign, and Sakura gets a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach.

“No one is answering at the riverfront,” Rin says without preamble, pulling herself in and falling into the passenger seat. “It’s regular operating hours right now and Fugaku has at _least_ twenty employees on site every day.”

There might be a perfectly reasonable explanation, but the chill down Sakura's spine says there’s not. Not a _mundane_ explanation, at least. She doesn’t argue with Rin's presence, just nods and pulls back onto the road, picking up speed as she heads them out of town.

“Have you heard anything?” she asks, because Rin strikes her as someone who covers all of her bases.

But Rin shakes her head, mouth set in a worried line. “No one in town knows anything,” she says. “I asked if there was a temporary shutdown, but no one had heard if there was.”

Sakura has heard of far less suspicious things. She glances at the light on her dashboard, but decides that not panicking people is probably the better option and lets herself speed instead. Rin doesn’t try for conversations, just sits tense and quiet right up until Sakura makes the turn off the main road and heads towards the riverfront.

At first glance, Sakura can't see anything out of place at the shipping yard—it’s quiet, and the bay that spreads out from where the Nakano meets the ocean is glittering like glass in the late afternoon sun. But on a second look—

“Only one car,” Rin says, grey-brown eyes scanning the gravel lot off to the side. “Where are all the others?”

“Not on their lunch break, probably,” Sakura says grimly, and drives right through the main gate, parking in front of the office. She slides out, grabbing a pair of fingerless gloves out of the pocket in the door, and tugs them on as she asks, “What are the odds that you’ll wait in the car if I tell you to?”

Rin flashes her an entirely too cute smile, then pulls a taser out of her pocket. “The fact that you're asking means you already know,” she says, and follows as Sakura heads for the door.

Since Sakura could definitely do worse for backup, especially when she’s still bruised and achy from her encounter with the mer this morning, she doesn’t protest that, either, just waves Rin to the side as she tests the door. It opens easily under her hand, and that’s mildly alarming; surely locking the office is standard procedure, even in a small town.

“Should I go around back?” Rin murmurs, voice barely audible.

Sakura debates it for half a second, but before she can even open her mouth there's a thump deeper into the building. She stiffens, fists clenching as heavy footsteps approach, and a moment later a figure appears around the corner of the doorway. A woman, tall and muscular with a long braid of blonde hair and black eyes, and she blinks at the sight of Sakura in the room. For a moment anger flickers in her face, cold and calculating in a way that makes Sakura automatically shift her weight and think _dangerous_ , but then her gaze falls on the badge hanging around Sakura's neck and she instantly relaxes.

“Sheriff. I didn’t even call yet,” she says, easing back.

“Yugito?” Rin asks, surprised, and sticks her head around the frame. “What are you doing here?”

Yugito lifts her head, and that cool anger is back, carved into every line of her beautiful face. “I brought Izumi lunch and noticed the yard was empty. Someone attacked her.”

“ _What_?” Sakura takes a sharp step forward, alarm spiking at the thought of Izumi hurt. Fugaku was an ass, but his assistant was sweet and kind, and if she’s seriously hurt—

“You're making it sound a lot more dramatic than it was, Yugito.”

Instantly, Yugito turns, ducking back into the inner part of the office, and Sakura follows without hesitation. Izumi is sitting in a chair next to her desk, holding an icepack to her head. She’s pale but looks mostly unharmed, and when she sees Sakura she offers a slightly wobbly smile. “Sheriff, I'm really glad you're here.”

Sakura is, too, especially since they had no idea anything had happened. gently, she shifts the icepack away, checking the lump, and then lets Izumi return it when there's no sign of bleeding. “What happened?”

Izumi winces. “After you left, Fugaku got a call. He sent everyone home and then headed for the bay, and I stayed to lock up and wait for Yugito. Someone shoved me into my office and locked the door, and I must have hit my head when I feel. Yugito found me.”

That sounds a hell of a lot like Fugaku was running, or at least preparing to do something shady. Sakura trades glances with Rin, then nods and steps back. “I’ll call an ambulance,” she says. “Whoever hurt you was probably after Fugaku, so we need to find him. You said he went towards the bay?”

With a nod, Izumi points out the dusty window, towards the far side of the shipping yard. “There's a road that follows the river and ends up right near the beach. He took his car, too.”

Given that they’re here to bring him in, Sakura can't really imagine anything _more_ suspicious. She rubs the bridge of her nose with a grimace, wonders who could have possibly called Fugaku and gotten that kind of a reaction. Obito? That seems likely. Then again, if Fugaku was in contact with Zori and Waraji, it’s possible he knows some other hired thug types and went to meet them, or even confront them. He struck Sakura as belligerent enough for it to make him stupid, and she doesn’t think it’s a false impression.

“I’ll take Izumi to the clinic,” Yugito says, curling her arm around Izumi's shoulders. “Sheriff. If you need help finding who did this—”

It’s Rin who says, “We’ll be fine. You two should go and get checked out.” She smiles at them both, but Sakura can see the lines of worry tight around her eyes. She’s probably thinking it was Obito, too, and that’s the logical assumption, given his threats. Given the fact that no one has spotted him in the last day and a half, either.

 “Do you know the road?” she asks Rin, silently cursing her lack of deputy. She’s going to have to leave Izumi and Yugito, leave the crime scene, but going after Fugaku takes precedence, since he might be in danger.

Determination settling into the tilt of her shoulders, Rin nods. “That’s the bay I told you about,” she says quietly. “The one where Kakashi almost drowned.”

Where Obito had his accident, Sakura remembers, and grimaces, nodding to the two other women and picking up a jog as she heads for the jeep again. Rin paces her, and as Sakura starts the car she points towards an opening in the chain-link fence that borders the shipping yard. “That’s the start of it. It’s a dirt road, maybe a mile and a half, and then there’s a trail down to the beach itself.”

Secluded enough for a meeting that shouldn’t be taking place to happen there, Sakura thinks grimly, and checks her mirror. Yugito is helping Izumi out of the office, and Sakura decides to have faith that they’ll make it to the clinic in once piece.

Whoever shoved Izumi into her office may not have intended to hurt her, given the way it happened; otherwise they would have just hit her over the head and left her. That doesn’t make it any less of a crime, the same way it wouldn’t have changed the sentence if Izumi had hit her head just a little too hard and died, but it does make Sakura curious. Zori and Waraji were killed without mercy, ripped apart, and the men at the old farmhouse weren’t given so much as a thought afterwards. Different people, then? But Obito seems to be the one after Fugaku, and there's nothing saying the farmhouse is connected except for Sakura's gut.

 _Return what you took, or I'm going to **make you**_ , she thinks, Obito's words to Fugaku on the street, and there's a flicker of thought, some vague sense of _almost_ having a connection—

Rin's breath catches, and it’s enough to make Sakura jerk her attention back to the dirt road. They’re in the forest, the path winding past the low hills that edge the nearest of the mountains, and the road is narrow and rutted. It looks like a thousand other backroads except for one thing—there's a pearl-grey hatchback parked at the very edge of the dirt, halfway onto the grass. No one inside, but there's practically no dust on it—Sakura's willing to bet it hasn’t been here long.

“Rin?” she asks.

Rin glances at her, then back at the road. “That’s Ino's car,” she says quietly.

 _Damn it_. Sakura pulls over behind the hatchback and gets out, only barely remembering to turn the engine off. She tugs her gloves up a little as she gets closer, but there's no sign of anyone else, and only one set of footsteps in the soft earth next to the track. Flats, small and dainty, and Sakura feels something like a chill. Ino must have come directly from the diner—those look like the shoes Sakura last saw her in, entirely unsuited to trekking through a forest or even wandering down a dirt road. If she’s out here on short notice, why? Especially after Fugaku got called out suddenly as well.

The door of the jeep slams, and Rin heads for the far edge of the road, peering down the bank. The river is a few hundred yards away, but it takes a turn away from the road and curves around the spur of forest. Still loud, but Sakura can still hear it clearly when Rin says, “I think she went this way.”

Judging by the tracks, Sakura thinks grimly, she did. The prints disappear across the hard-packed earth, then reappear again only to start sliding down the bank.

“What’s down there?” Sakura asks, following the trail as far as she can see, until it disappears into the trees.

Rin pauses, like she’s trying to remember. “A shortcut, I think,” she says slowly. “Up to the top of cliffs. It’s only a foot-trail, though—we’ll have to leave the car.”

That’s fine by Sakura. She still has her hiking boots, even if Izumi's spare skirt and Rin's extra sweatshirt are less than appropriate for stomping around in a forest. She nods, then immediately starts down the bank. “I’ll take the trail,” she says. “You take the jeep and keep to the road. The keys are in it.”

“Sakura—” Rin starts, but Sakura waves a hand and slides down through the wet grass and mud, keeping her eyes on the narrow trail. Easy to see where Ino slipped, and Sakura grits her teeth, trying not to think about what she’s doing. Stupid, so _stupid_ to go after Ino instead of directly after Fugaku, but Ino is a link to Obito, Ino is funny and pretty and makes good coffee and Sakura is an _idiot_.

She catches herself on a tree, curses at herself when the whole thing shakes, and quickly lets go. Not good to lose her temper, but there's a gnawing worry in her chest, the thought of Izumi unconscious in her office and Zori and Waraji in pieces on the beach far too close for comfort.

Through the trees, she catches a distant flash of white against the sea’s blue, and it only takes a moment to recognize the lighthouse she spotted from the Landing that morning, seen from the opposite side this time. It makes her wonder exactly how far this beach is from the garden Sai's brother used to own, how far from the stranger in the woods who ran from them and disappeared into the ocean. Another piece of all of this?

At this point, Sakura is fairly certain she can't afford to assume otherwise. It’s—

From up ahead, there's a cry. A woman’s cry, sharp and high and instantly cut off with a sound of pain, and Sakura is running before she can think, twisting between a rocky outcropping and a tree and leaping the narrow creek behind it. There's another voice, raised and angry, and then a third, and Sakura gauges the distance, catches a flash of gold through the trees, and drops low, ducking to the side and behind a fallen tree. Carefully, she clenches her fists, testing the give of her gloves, and then risks a glance out.

 _Cliffs_ , Rin had kept saying, and Sakura hadn’t quite realized that she actually meant it, but a few hundred yards away the ground simply ends, dropping off towards the ocean. Right at the edge is Fugaku, and he’s holding Ino as she struggles, one arm looped around her throat and his other hand sealed over her mouth. Sakura tenses, reaches for her gun, but—

“ _Stop it_!” Obito snarls, and once again Sakura can't tell if it’s fury or fear or both. He takes a step forward, towards Fugaku, but Fugaku’s grip tightens enough to make Ino squeak and he stops short. Easy to read the violence in the set of his shoulders, and he looks rough, one eye blackened by a spreading bruise, the fabric of his shirt sliced open and showing a nasty wound underneath. A knife wound, Sakura thinks, and Zori had a sheath for a knife but no actual blade. Maybe he lost it while he was fighting with Obito and it ended up in the ocean, or maybe Obito took it after he was hurt.

“ _You_ are the one who needs to stop,” Fugaku says icily. “Come to your senses and—”

“I _did_!” Obito growls, and his hands are fisted tight enough to make his knuckles strain white. “I came to my senses ten years ago, when I told you to go fuck yourself. My answer’s not going to change.”

There's a pause, and then Fugaku breathes out, expression hardening. “That’s unfortunate,” he says, and the deep disappointment in his tone is enough to make Sakura bristle instinctively, even if she only catches the edges of it. Clearly it has a similar effect on Obito, because he snarls, takes another step forward only to stop when Fugaku retreats. One of Ino's feet slips off the edge of the cliff, and she makes a sound of alarm, jerking in Fugaku’s hold, but he hauls her up and back another step.

“Just—let her go,” Obito says, all sharp edges like broken glass. “Let her go, stop fucking—Hiashi is—”

“ _Don’t_ ,” Fugaku snaps, and Sakura frowns, because that’s the first loss of control she’s seen from him. “Don’t you dare, boy. I still have more than enough leverage to ruin your existence. Unless you don’t _care_.”

Sakura has seen the desperation that crosses Obito's face before, but always in people backed into a corner and left with no choices. Always with bad endings, or painful ones. She curses inwardly, but this is devolving, and Fugaku has a _hostage_. Getting involved is her only option.

“Why don’t you let Ino go, Mr. Uchiha?” she asks evenly as she steps out, watches both Fugaku and Obito twitch. Fugaku snaps his head around to look at her, eyes narrowing, and Ino makes a sound of relief. Her blue eyes are bright with fear as she stares at Sakura, and Sakura looks back, trying to make it a silent promise that she won't let Ino get hurt.

“Sheriff,” Fugaku says coldly. “Are you trespassing now?”

“Considering that you’ve got a hostage, I think I'm well within my rights,” Sakura returns. “Let Ino go. We’ll all head back to town and you can talk things out without threats of murder.”

Fugaku laughs, low and mocking. “You have no authority,” he says. “The mayor is gone, you're the only member of your office. I own half the town, and very soon I’ll own the rest as well.” He glances over at Obito, a thin smile twisting his mouth, and demands, “Tell me.”

But Obito is staring at Sakura, dark gaze steady and almost startled. A glance from her to Ino, and then he _smiles_. It’s a bare, awful thing, full of fury, and he turns from Sakura, stalking towards his uncle.

“You stole something of mine,” he says, and when Fugaku’s eyes snap back to him he tips his chin up, the motion a threat. “If you're not going to give up _now_ , I’m going to take the same thing from you.”

Fugaku scoffs, then jerks Ino's feet off the ground and turns. Instinctively, Sakura lunges, Ino's muffled scream vibrating through her, but Fugaku’s warning, “ _Don’t_!” stops her in her tracks. Obito freezes, too, even as Ino kicks and struggles against Fugaku’s arm, feet dangling off the edge of the cliff.

“You already have the ruin of your family on your conscience,” Fugaku tells Obito coldly. “Would you like the girl’s death as well?”

“As you keep telling me, I don’t _have_ a family,” Obito bites out, but his eye flickers to Sakura, and he catches her gaze for a brief moment before his attention snaps back to Fugaku. “I don’t give fuck about your _ruin_ , but Ino didn’t do anything to you.”

“Of course she did.” Fugaku leans forward, and Ino cries out, grabbing onto his arm around her throat as her feet slip again. “She’s been passing information to you since you got back. Treachery like that can't be borne.”

“ _Treachery_? Are you even _listening_ to yourself?” Obito demands. “This is _Konoha_ , not some organized crime ring.”

“I suppose you’d know,” Fugaku returns, but—

All of his attention, all of his outrage—it’s all on Obito right now. Sakura slides a step forward, judging the distance, calculating the best angle, and breathes out. There's no saying why Obito is helping, why Obito _cares_ when he seemed just fine intimidating Ino for information at the diner, but she isn't about to look a gift horse in the mouth.

“You took him,” Obito says, and it’s so sharply furious that the words _cut_. “I left, I wasn’t planning to _ever_ come back to this fucking place, but you're the one who dragged me here and—”

A loud crash echoes through the trees, and a massive shape bursts out of the forest. Fugaku startles, and in the same moment Obito and Sakura both lunge. Sakura aims, gets a hand on Fugaku’s shirt and the other on Ino's arm and hauls them both back, but Obito crashes into them a second later. He grabs Ino, throws her into Sakura hard enough to knock them both back towards the trees, and throws himself and Fugaku both over the edge of the cliff.

The huge black horse slides to a stop there, peering over, and then turns. Its mane is full of riverweed, Sakura realizes, even as she rolls to her feet and comes up in a ready crouch, and there's a burning violet light in its eyes that’s in no way natural. It stares at Sakura for a long moment, unnerving intelligence in its eyes, and then turns, picking up a canter and vanishing back into the shadows of the trees.

With a curse, Sakura hurries forward, leaning over the edge to look for Obito and Fugaku. There's no sign of them, though, no one clinging to the cliff. Just the water a hundred feet below, crashing against the rocks. She can't see any bodies, but the odds of surviving a fall into that kind of spot seem slim at best. Obito had to have known that, had to have considered it; he didn’t strike Sakura as suicidal, just angry, and even that was controlled and calculating and _used_ , like just another weapon.

It’s not the most important thing right now, though. Sakura crosses back to Ino's side as the woman pushes herself up, getting an arm around her waist and helping her. She coughs, pressing her hands to her throat, and then grimaces. “That _fucker_ ,” she gets out.

Sakura smiles despite herself, smooths Ino's loose hair back over her shoulder to get it out of her face. “Are you all right?” she asks.

Ino shudders, leaning into her hold, and then glances up with a wobbly smile. “I’m going to be having nightmares for a while,” she says, and grimaces. Tipping forward, she presses her forehead against the curve of Sakura's shoulder, and then says, muffled, “I _hate_ heights.”

Damn it. Sakura wraps her arms around Ino, feeling the fine shivers running through her, and looks at the edge of the cliff again. Fugaku either knew exactly what he was doing or managed to pick the best place to terrorize Ino entirely by accident, and somehow, Sakura suspects the former.

“You're okay now,” she says, because there's nothing else _to_ say. “They both fell. Fugaku is gone.”

“Not exactly,” Rin says, pushing her way out of the trees. She looks out of breath, and there's a smear of dirt on one cheek. Her cardigan is rumpled, too, wet in several places. “Fugaku and Obito are both strong swimmers. I'm sure they made the dive.”

Sakura tries not to grimace. _Strong swimmers_ seems like it wouldn’t be enough, given the look of the cliffs, and really, what are the odds that there isn't something else going on here, in the face of that? It’s less important right now, though, and she carefully helps Ino to her feet, then asks Rin, “The jeep is close?”

Rin hesitates. “Kind of?” she offers, and when Sakura blinks she clarifies, “It’s right down the hill, at the road. But some rocks fell as I got here. I think the way back is blocked until we call for help.

Rocks? God, Sakura is actually _relieved_ to have a problem she can deal with here. “Stay with Ino,” she says. “I’ll go check.”

Rin looks vaguely doubtful, but she nods, crouching down next to Ino. “Will you let me look at your throat?” she asks gently.

Obediently, Ino tips her head back, and Sakura leaves them to it, pushing her way back into the forest. There's no sign of the horse, not even hoofprints in the dirt, but she doesn’t linger to look for them. The silhouette of her jeep is clear, and Sakura picks her way down the steep slope, then leaps the last few feet to land on the road.

Rin was right—it looks like a minor landslide, but Sakura is a little too suspicious to believe it was natural. She presses a hand to one of the larger boulders, testing its weight, and then glances up at the slope above the road. The path of the boulders is clear, the earth torn and muddy where they rolled, but the places where they must have been lodged are deep, and it’s unlikely they fell on their own.

Someone was trying to trap them here, Sakura thinks grimly. Someone wanted them stranded in the forest with Fugaku, and if the horse hadn’t distracted Fugaku, if Obito hadn’t been willing to throw them both off of the cliff, that encounter likely would have ended with Rin, Ino, and Sakura having to run through the forest, unable to drive back, with Fugaku and someone else after them.

She breathes out through her nose, angry and trying to contain it. Pulls her gloves up, sets her fingers against the surface of the boulder, and _shoves_.

A full ton of rock rolls to the side, as easy as a billiard ball.

Satisfying, but not enough. Sakura turns sharply, plants her foot, and throws a punch the way she taught herself, all of her weight behind it. Her knuckles meet rock, and there's a bare second of resistance before the whole thing shatters, chips of stone exploding out. The next two meet the same fate, and then Sakura pulls up, flexing her fingers lightly.

The road is clear, and three punches might not be enough to get all of Sakura's aggravation with the situation out, but it’s good enough for now. She stalks back to her jeep, checking the tires in case someone decided to slash them, but apparently they thought the rocks would be enough.

“Sakura?” Rin calls.

“Road’s clear!” Sakura calls back. “The rocks must have broken when the last few stones hit them.”

“What?” Rin pauses at the edge of the road, blinking at the rubble, at the clear path, at Sakura. Close behind her, Ino casts a glance at the shifted rock, brows rising, but she doesn’t comment.

“Come on,” Sakura tells them, ignoring the question in Rin's face. She opens the door of the jeep, sliding in, and says, “We need to go back to the station, and then _someone_ needs to tell me what the hell is going on here.”

Ino meets her eyes, and she’s still pale, her lips tight, her golden hair wild around her shoulders, but she nods, accepts the hand Sakura offers to pull her into the passenger seat.

“I’ll tell you everything I know,” she says quietly, and casts a glance back towards the cliff, then shudders. “I don’t know everything, but—it might help.”

“Anything will help at this point,” Sakura says, though she keeps her tone gentle, doesn’t let it turn into an accusation.

Ino nods tightly, then turns away, keeping her eyes fixed out the window as Rin climbs into the back. Sakura glances back at Rin, who just shakes her head in confusion, and then sighs and starts the car.


	8. And then take hands

There are bruises shading to life around Ino’s throat, livid and dark. Not the shape of a hand, the way Sakura's seen in some cases, but a solid band that speaks to just how tightly Fugaku was holding her. It makes something dark and a little hard curl in Sakura's chest, and she has to tear her eyes away from the marks as she presses a cup of tea into Ino's hands.

“I hope you don’t mind peppermint,” she says. “The only other option is something unlabeled, and I'm sure Mizuki was a stand-up guy but I’d rather not drug you accidentally.”

Ino smiles as she wraps her fingers around the mug, and there's a shadow behind it, something that Sakura thinks might almost be viciousness, but it’s gone before she can really tell. “Thanks,” Ino says, and it rasps, but she coughs to clear her throat, winces, and then takes a careful sip.

“Here,” Rin says gently, and offers up another of her oversized cardigans, unbuttoned and more like a heavy knit blanket than a sweater. She drapes it around Ino's shoulders, and with a shiver Ino pulls it closer, buries herself in lavender yarn and ducks her head to hide her face.

Sakura's seen enough breakdowns to know that Ino's teetering on the edge of one. With a grimace at her own helplessness here, she takes a seat on the edge of her desk and carefully rests a hand on Ino's shoulder, gripping lightly. It’s just intended to be reassurance, but when she feels it Ino makes a low, desperate noise and leans into Sakura's body. She’s shaking still, just faintly, and Sakura wraps one arm around her, carefully catching the mug of tea with her free hand to steady it.

“You're okay now,” she says quietly, and Ino lets out a sound that’s nearly a laugh.

“Because of you,” she says, and rubs the back of her wrist over her eyes, smearing her makeup. If Sakura did that she’d look like a hungover raccoon, but when Ino glances up with a wavering smile she just looks tragically beautiful. Sakura would mind, except Ino's looking right at her, and it’s hard to care about anything but the hurt in pale blue eyes.

“I think it was a joint effort,” Sakura manages, though her throat is a little tight and she can't pull her gaze away from Ino's. “By me, Obito, and the magically appearing and disappearing horse.”

Rin clears her throat, twisting her fingers together. “You’ve been talking to Obito?” she asks, and it’s not quite changing the subject, but it’s close enough that Sakura shoots her a look. She either doesn’t see it or ignores it, but before Sakura can decide which, Ino laughs hoarsely.

“The whole time,” she confirms, and her smile is wry as she looks up, meeting Rin's gaze and then Sakura's. “He saved my life when I was six.”

Judging by the way Rin's eyes widen, this isn't something she’s heard before. “What?” she demands. “How?”

Ino tips her head against Sakura's shoulder, letting her long hair hide her face. “My family owns a couple of lots in town and along the coast,” she says, and the strained smile she flashes at Sakura makes it clear this part of the explanation is for her benefit. “When I was a kid, the shipping yard came up for sale, and Daddy put in a bid to buy it. Someone kidnapped me to force him to withdraw the offer.”

The shipping yard that the Uchiha now own? Sakura doesn’t need all her years of experience as a cop to smell a rat. “The Uchiha?” she asks.

Ino tips one shoulder in a wry shrug. “That’s what my family thought, and the sheriff, but Kushina could never find any evidence. I don’t know where they kept me, either, just that it was up in the hills by the river. When one of the men went out for a smoke break, I snuck out and ran. They chased me all the way to the cliffs, but—Obito was there. And when he saw they were after me, he stepped in.”

Unlike some people, Sakura isn't much of a gambler, but she’d be willing to put money down on it being the same stretch of cliff where Fugaku just had Ino. Because Fugaku had a hand in the kidnapping the first time, though, or just because he learned about it somehow and thought it would be a good way to terrorize Ino? There's no way to say at this moment, and it’s more frustrating then it probably should be. She tightens her grip on Ino, pulling her a little more firmly against her chest, and can feel when she swallows hard.

“He asked me not to tell anyone,” Ino says, a little muffled, but it’s almost plaintive. “I just—he was so kind, and I told everyone that I got away by myself. But he kept checking on me, making sure I was okay, even after he left. And—three months ago I called him for help.”

“For help?” Rin sounds alarmed, and in the wake of finding out that Ino was kidnapped and held for ransom, Sakura can fully understand the reaction.

Ino nods, takes a careful breath. Then she straightens, tipping her chin up, and the look on her face dares either of them to call her a liar. “Someone was following me,” she says. “They pulled parts out of my car so it wouldn’t run, and they followed me home every day after work, and someone was in my house in the middle of the night. It went on for _weeks_ , so I called Obito and asked him what to do.”

“Not the sheriff?” Sakura asks, frowning a little. That sounds like a hell of a lot more than following—that’s _stalking_ , predation, and just the thought of it makes her skin crawl. “Surely he could have done something.”

“Sheriff Mizuki told me I had an overactive imagination, and a week later he said I was making things up for attention,” Ino says, an edge of poison sweetness to the words. “I only called him twice.”

Sakura winces. With that response, she really can't blame Ino for resorting to calling a friend instead. “So Obito came out to help you?” she prompts, though—three months is a long time to stick around without letting any of his friends except for Ino know. And then there's what Ino said when he walked into the diner— _what are you doing here_ , like she didn’t expect his presence.

And Ino is already shaking her head, too, setting the cup down on Sakura's other side to twist her fingers in her lap. “He said that him coming in person would just make the whole thing worse if Fugaku found out,” she says, and glances up, holding Sakura's gaze. “But he had a friend who was passing this way who was willing to stop. I went and stayed with Sai for a week without telling anyone where I was, and Obito's friend stayed in my house. We—the stalking _stopped_.” She rubs at her eyes again, making a low sound of distress. “Obito's friend chased them off. I thought everything went back to normal, and the friend was only supposed to stay one more day, but—he was going to stay with Izumo and Kotetsu but he never showed up. He just—vanished.”

 _You took him_ , Obito said, and Sakura closes her eyes, breathing out slow and careful. _You took him_ , and the group at the farmhouse had a prisoner, and Obito is _looking_ for someone that Fugaku took. Obito said he never intended to come back, but Fugaku forced him to. Fugaku said _tell me_ on the cliffs, like that was the most important thing even with all of his grandstanding, so Fugaku wants information that Obito has, and to get it—

“Damn,” she breathes, then swallows down the curses that want to follow.

“Sakura?” Rin asks carefully, watching her with wide eyes.

Assuming Obito and Fugaku survived their fall—and Rin seems perfectly convinced that they did—and managed to get away without one killing the other, Sakura is willing to bet that this isn't anywhere close to done yet. Fugaku has already taken one hostage, and if he tries to take another one, Ino is the most likely victim.

“Do you have anyone who can cover your shifts at the diner?” she asks, curling her fingers against Ino's arm. “It’s possible that Fugaku will come after you again. Staying with me isn't the _most_ obscure place, but it will at least take you out of the direct line of fire.”

Ino's eyes widen, and then she smiles. Leaning over, she drops her head on Sakura's shoulder and exhales, heavy and relieved. “Thanks, Sheriff,” she says, and the weight of her head is warm and steady above Sakura's heart. “I—thank you.”

“I think at this point you can just call me Sakura,” Sakura says dryly, but she slides her arm a little further around Ino and glances up at Rin. “Rin, you—”

“Am going to keep doing my job,” Rin interrupts firmly. “Which means being around to help you, especially now.”

Sakura hesitates, but by the mulish expression on Rin's face, pushing isn't going to change anything, so she lets it go with an aggravated sigh. “Fine. Just—carry your taser.”

Rin accepts that with a smile and a cheeky salute that’s a little too lighthearted for the situation, but everyone deals with stress their own way. Sakura doesn’t comment on it. Instead, she tugs her phone out of her pocket to check the time, since the sunlight outside is fading. Evening, and she takes a breath, then gently nudges Ino upright. “Ino, who called you to get you out on the cliffs?” she asks.

For a moment, Ino hesitates, biting her lip. Glances up, then smiles a little wryly. “I got a text from a number I didn’t know, saying it was Obito. When I called his regular phone he didn’t pick up, so I thought he’d switched to a different one or something. He asked to meet.”

Likely Fugaku, Sakura thinks with a grimace, and her earlier plan to get the man in an interrogation room is looking increasingly appealing. “I probably don’t have to tell you not to make the same mistake again,” she says, and when Ino rolls her eyes she lifts her hands in surrender. “Just saying.”

Thankfully, Ino smiles a little, retrieving her mug of tea and settling back in her chair. “My cousin Fū can take over the diner for a while,” she says, pulling her phone out of her pocket and weighing it thoughtfully in one hand for a minute. “All my stuff is still in the office, though. Can I—?”

“I’ll go pick it up,” Sakura volunteers. “I can meet your cousin and pass on anything you need me to, but I don’t want you out in public until Fugaku at least shows his face again. If I had any deputies, you’d get full-time protection, but…” She grimaces, waving a hand at the empty office.

“I'm sure someone will volunteer eventually,” Ino says, and laughs a little. “You're only intimidating until someone’s seen you inhale coffee like you have asbestos for a tongue.”

Intimidating? Sakura's short and favors pink and has been called _unfortunately cute_ by more than one trainer over the years. She’s not entirely sure what Ino sees that most people miss, but Ino just smiles at her raised eyebrow and doesn’t elaborate. She digs through her pockets instead, and a moment later comes up with a ring of keys. “Fū is going to need these, and the one with the red nail polish on it will get you into the office for my stuff. It’s the dark blue messenger bag.”

Sakura nods, taking it and sliding it into the pocket of her coat. “If you need me to get your car—”

Ino shakes her head. “It broke down again. Shikamaru said he wasn’t done fixing it but I took it anyway, since it was too far to walk. I’ll have him tow it back to his place again.”

As far as lucky days go, Ino's probably due one, Sakura thinks wryly. That’s a lot of misfortune for one day. “All right,” she says. “Call your cousin and I’ll head over there now. Rin, do you think Kotetsu and Izumo would be willing to tell people Ino is staying with them?”

Rin brightens. “Definitely. They're incurable gossips, too, if they're not asked to keep a secret, so no one will think it’s weird for them to be saying anything.”

Perfect. Sakura nods, then rises to her feet. “Stay away from the windows as much as you can right now. Rin, are you okay to stay with her until I get back?”

“Of course, Sakura.” Rin touches Ino on the shoulder, then heads for the phone on the desk. Sakura takes one last look around the office, but hesitates again.

“Call me if _anything_ happens,” she tells Ino. “Even if it’s just a bad feeling.”

“Thank you, Sheriff. _Sakura,_ ” Ino corrects, and pulls her legs up under her in the chair as she draws Rin's cardigan closer around her shoulders. “I will, I promise.”

That’s the best Sakura can do right now, so she nods, grabs her keys off the desk, and heads for the door. The darkening sky is made even darker by rainclouds, and Sakura eyes them unhappily as she slides into her jeep. She doesn’t generally mind bad weather, but this storm so close on the heels of the last one is a little depressing. It also makes her wonder about the bay, and whether the water will rise. Whether there will be any more bodies washing up on the beach, too, because Rin's words aside that was a hell of a fall.

Flexing her fingers in her gloves, Sakura shakes off the thoughts, making a tight turn and heading for the diner at a carefully reasonable speed. Whether he survived or not, Fugaku likely had help, including whoever was holding Obito's friend at the farmhouse. If any of his family share the same goal, want whatever information Obito has, they’ll likely keep trying to grab Obito, and Ino will stay in the crossfire.

Sakura doesn’t like this. She’s understaffed, and Fugaku's words about her being the only one of her office are ringing in her head. He said the mayor was gone, too, and Sakura doesn’t know what he meant by that, but—she definitely hasn’t gotten any calls from his office since she arrived. Her old boss said he was on vacation, but he also said that Mizuki quit despite the man going _missing_ , so Sakura isn't overly inclined to trust the information she got before. She isn't sure if it was an attempt to get her to accept the offer faster, but given the way her last case in the city ended, that’s more likely than she’d prefer.

“Werewolf fighting rings _suck_ ,” she tells the dashboard with a grimace, because if she hadn’t stumbled onto what looked from the outside like a dog-fighting ring, if Temari hadn’t crashed into the middle of her case with her demon-possessed little brother—

If that hadn’t happened, Ino probably would have died on that cliff, or Obito would have been forced to give up. Sakura draws in a slow breath, reminds herself very firmly of that fact, and pulls into an open parking space in front of the diner.

It’s quiet when she pushes open the door, the woman with the buns who was here earlier sprawled out on her back in a booth reading a book, but no other customers present. The brown-haired woman glances up when the bell chimes, then calls loudly, “Chōji, up front!”

“Thanks, Tenten.” Chōji steps around the edge of the divider, wiping his hands on his apron, and smiles at Sakura. “Sheriff, good evening. If you're looking for Ino, she left earlier.”

“Can I talk to you in the back for a second?” Sakura asks, because she’ll need to tell Chōji _something_ if Ino's not coming back tonight. They seem like close friends.

Something like panic flickers across Chōji’s face, and he catches himself on the edge of the bar. “Sheriff? Is—”

“Ino's fine,” Sakura says, a little belatedly, and winces. She fishes Ino's keys out of her pocket and holds them up. “I just need you to show me where the office is.”

Chōji doesn’t look entirely reassured, but he nods and heads towards a door in the back wall. It opens into a storeroom, and there's another door to the left. Chōji pauses there, watching Sakura flip to the right key, and then asks quietly, “Sheriff? Is she really okay?”

Sakura pauses, but—they were so obviously friends, when she saw them together. “A little shaken,” she says, equally quiet. “There was an incident on the cliffs. Ino's going to be staying with me for the next few days.”

Relief slides over his face, and Chōji gives her a thankful smile. “Good,” he says. “I'm really glad. Can I make you dinner to take back with you? I know Ino forgot to eat before she left, and—it’s the least I can do.”

“I think Ino would appreciate that,” Sakura tells him, and offers him a smile of her own. “I know I would. Your food is fantastic.”

Chōji laughs, flushing a little. “Thanks, Sheriff—”

“Chōji, more customers! Three parties!”

With a groan, Chōji calls back, “Can't you waitress for one night, Tenten?”

There's a laugh, and a moment later Tenten sticks her head through the door of the storeroom. “Are you really that desperate?” she asks, and when Chōji gives her a pleading look she rolls her eyes. “Fine, but you owe me pie.”

“Peach,” Chōji promises. “And a lemon meringue if you don’t make anyone cry tonight. Me included.”

Tenten beams before she vanishes again, calling a bright, “Be right with you! Sit wherever you like!”

There's a moment of silence as Sakura raises a brow and Chōji pulls a face, and then Sakura asks dryly, “Is crying likely?”

Chōji’s smile is a little sheepish. “Tenten is sweet, but she’s got a temper even when she’s smiling. Ino was a little more relieved than she should have been when Tenten quit.”

Sakura laughs a little, because she’s met people like that. “Ino said she was going to call her cousin in,” she offers. “I'm supposed to wait here to pass over the keys.”

The relief that fills Chōji’s face is nearly tangible. “Oh, thank goodness. No matter what cousin it is, they’ll be a good fit. Thanks, Sheriff.”

Sakura nods, steps back. “Sorry to hold you up,” she says, because voices are rising from the main room, enough to fill several tables. Apparently she just beat the rush here.

“They come in waves,” Chōji says with good humor, and turns to leave, calling over his shoulder, “I’ll get your meals ready to go, Sheriff. It will just be a few minutes.”

“Thanks, Chōji.” Sakura watches the door fall shut, then turns back to the office, unlocking the door and stepping in. It’s neat, with wide windows and lots of potted plants, and she can't help but smile. It feels a lot like Ino in here, and it smells green and floral. The bag Ino described is hanging neatly on a hook next to Ino's long coat, and Sakura pulls both down from the wall half a second before her phone chimes with a text.

Stomach sinking, Sakura grimaces, but she puts the bag down on the desk and grabs for her phone, opening it to see a notification from just about the last person she expected. Eyebrows rising, she taps on the message, and Temari's text fills the screen.

**Does this place even have a motel**

Oh no, Sakura thinks, not sure whether to feel bemused or horrified. _You're not coming to Konoha._

**Don’t get the wrong idea. I'm coming to save the mers from YOU.**

Temari is always a ray of sunshine, Sakura thinks with a groan, rubbing her forehead. _There's no motel._

**How big is your couch.**

For a long moment, Sakura stares at the message, telling herself that it can't mean what she thinks. Except of course it can, because this is _Temari_. She stabs a finger at the call button, and when it picks up on the first ring she says, “You're not bringing your _demon-possessed brother_ to _my town_.”

“Which one are we considering demon-possessed now?” Temari asks, but she sounds distracted. Driving, Sakura assumes, and pulls a face. “Because I know your opinions on Gaara, but I swear Kankurō’s laundry is starting to gain sentience.”

“Hey!” a muffled voice in the background protests. “I said I’d do it when we got back!”

“If Sakura doesn’t think my presence will be helpful, I will stay outside of town,” a second, much flatter voice offers.

“No, you won't,” Temari says firmly. “ _Outside of town_ is apparently wilderness and I don’t want you terrorizing the fauna again.”

“There are plenty of deer,” Gaara says, sounding faintly miffed. “I was—”

“ _Temari_ ,” Sakura hisses. “Are you already on your way _here_?”

There's a pause, careful, as Temari picks her words. “Mers are brutal,” she finally says. “And where there's one, there are usually more. They live in shoals, and they usually hunt in packs.”

Not the one Sakura saw, or at least she didn’t notice any other creatures in the water. With a groan, she sinks down on the edge of Ino's chair, and says heatedly, “Temari, I'm in the middle of a case. Do you remember what happened _last time_ you interrupted one of my cases? Because I definitely do.”

“I remember,” Temari returns, biting. “I saved your _life_.”

“Does that mean she owes you a life debt?” Gaara asks, perfectly flat. “Are you allowed to kill her now?”

“I'm not going to kill Sakura,” Temari tells him, and Sakura would be more sympathetic to the tiredness in her tone if she wasn’t butting into Sakura's life when she’s definitely not wanted. “Look, Sakura, you called me—”

“I asked you to identify _one creature_! Over _text_!”

“You called me,” Temari continues doggedly. “We both know what’s out there, and no deputy in a town like that is going to have any idea what to do with an angry mer. They’ll call you crazy if you even bring it _up_. No one believes in monsters anymore.”

“I wouldn’t be so sure about that,” Sakura mutters, because _something_ is strange about Konoha. Still, Temari has a point, as much as Sakura hates to admit it. Temari's one of the best hunters on this side of the country, possessed brother aside, and having her as backup won't be terrible. Louder, she says, “I don’t _have_ a deputy, or I would tell you to turn right around and go back to Suna. You're _not_ going to interfere in my case, okay?”

“Sure, cherry pie,” Temari drawls, and the old nickname makes Sakura narrow her eyes in irritation. “So? Your couch?”

“Won't fit all three of you,” Sakura retorts. “There's a bed and breakfast but they only have two rooms. Three if you count the crime scene. And I think one of the others is rented and the other is closed for the season.”

Temari makes a dissatisfied noise. “I don’t have any camping gear,” she says, and sighs. “Text me the number for the bed and breakfast. Maybe I can convince them to open the other room.”

“Don’t even _think_ of touching my crime scene,” Sakura warns. “And tell Kankurō too.”

“Kankurō is well aware of what you’ll do to him if he puts a toe out of line,” Temari says, amused. “Were there—”

Before she can finish, the office door opens, and a tall man with auburn hair steps in, asking, “Sheriff? Chōji said—oh, sorry.”

Sakura gives him a quick smile. “I’ll get that to you by the end of the day,” she says.

“Bye, Sakura.” Temari hangs up the way she always does, abruptly. It makes Sakura roll her eyes, pulling the phone from her ear, and she turns a smile on the man.

“Sorry about that,” she says, rising. “Can I help you?”

He smiles, and in an instant the resemblance to Ino comes clear. “I'm Fū Yamanaka. Ino said she gave you her keys?”

“Of course.” Sakura passes them over, gives him a smile. “I appreciate you being willing to come in on such short notice. This is all happening rather quickly.”

“So Ino mentioned.” His smile slants towards wryness. “Just—keep her safe. I can cover for as long as she needs me to. I just don’t want her putting herself in any more danger.”

“I don’t want that, either,” Sakura says, and it comes out more honest than she intends, less professional and more personal. Stupid, but—that’s proving to be something of a pattern, where her reactions to Ino are concerned. “I’ll do everything I can, I promise.”

The words should be rote, easy, automatic reassurances. Sakura doesn’t know what it says about her that that they're not.

Something in her tone must convince Fū, though, because the set of his shoulders eases faintly, and he nods gratefully. “Good,” he says, with a faint thread of humor. “She gets into more than enough trouble to always need a sheriff on her tail.”

Sakura thinks about confessions of being kidnapped, friendships with dangerous people, being stalked, walking home through the forest at midnight, agreeing to meet people alone in the woods after a suspicious text, getting _dangled off a cliff_ , and groans, covering her eyes. “God,” she says. “I'm coming to understand that, yeah.”

Fū laughs at her, but at least it’s vaguely sympathetic. Sakura appreciates the effort.


	9. Curtsied when you have, and kiss'd

There's a man leaning on Sakura's jeep.

She pauses in the door of the diner, eyes narrowing, and curls her fingers a little more tightly into the takeout bags, debating whether she should set them down on the street or just try to juggle them all. Losing dinner is less than appealing, but she’s on edge. Finding a stranger waiting for her isn't helping.

“Is there a reason you're loitering?” she asks warily, judging the distance between them. Enough to move, if she needs to. Sakura knows how to throw a fast punch.

With a grin, the man pushes upright, stepping up onto the curb. He’s tall and lanky, with curly dark hair and pretty eyes framed by long lashes, wearing a thin white tank top despite the frosty bite to the air. “You're definitely the sheriff, aren’t you?” he asks cheerfully.

Sakura considers retreating, even half a step, but doesn’t. She tips her chin up instead, sets her feet. It’s been a long day, and punching boulders isn't nearly as satisfying as punching someone attacking her. If this guy wants to try it, he’s in for an unpleasant surprise.

“Well-spotted,” she says, because it’s _really_ been a long day. “Can I help you?”

His grin is bright, holds nothing but warm amusement. There's no edge of malice in his handsome face, but Sakura is still wary. “Sorry, Sheriff, I just saw your car and decided to stop for a second. I'm not loitering, I'm _waiting_.”

That’s what Sakura is worried about. She looks him over, meets those dark eyes, and breathes out a sigh, shifting her food to one arm. “You're an Uchiha, right?” she asks.

Surprise flickers over his face. “Yeah, Shisui Uchiha. How’d you know?”

 _None of you seem to believe in jackets_ , Sakura doesn’t say. “Lucky guess,” she offers instead, desert-dry. And—Fugaku mentioned him, didn’t he? The first time Sakura met him, this morning even if it feels like weeks ago. _What in the world did Shisui do this time_ , with an exasperation that made it feel like a frequent question.

“You’re the troublemaker?” she asks, raising a brow, and looks him over. Tall and lean, probably twenty-two or twenty-three, and there's a tattoo on his forearm, a strange mark with two crescents on either end, facing opposite directions, connected by a line with a short bar crossing it perpendicularly. Not a tribal tattoo, and definitely not something Sakura is familiar with. It looks like it should have meaning, too deliberate for anything else.

Shisui laughs, and he’s certainly the cheeriest member of his family that Sakura has met. “You’ve been talking to my uncle,” he says. “He just doesn’t like me.”

That honestly makes Sakura far more inclined to like Shisui. It’s possible her old boss was right about her contrary streak. “If this is about Fugaku,” she starts.

Raising his hands, Shisui shakes his head. “It’s not,” he says firmly, and loses his smile as he meets Sakura's eyes. “Sheriff, I _know_ you have a job to do, but—please. If you find Obito, get him out of town. Don’t even stop to _think_. He needs to be past Konoha's city limits, preferably with a mountain between him and this place.”

Of all the things Sakura was expecting him to say, that’s very definitely the last. She pauses, assessing the tone, the words, but he looks perfectly sincere. “So far I haven’t had a very good track record of even _finding_ Obito,” she says. “You might have more luck than me.”

Shisui's smile is crooked. “I really, really won't,” he says wryly. “Obito isn't going to talk to any Uchiha right now. Fugaku told us to bring Obito to him, and Obito isn't going to risk that.”

This is sounding so much like mob business that Sakura half-wonders if she should call up her organized crime connections. “I've been getting the impression that Obito can take care of himself,” she counters. The bodies on the beach are likely proof enough of that.

Something dark passes over Shisui's face, leeching the humor in an instant. He straightens, and Sakura is suddenly aware that for all he’s slender he has obvious muscle, ropy and defined. “He can't,” Shisui says, so certainly that it’s hard to doubt him. “Sheriff, you _need_ to find him and get him out of Konoha.”

Sakura frowns, wants to cross her arms but is thwarted by the takeout bags. “Fugaku—”

But Shisui shakes his head, mouth tight. “My uncle isn't the only thing Obito needs to be afraid of in this town,” he says quietly, meeting Sakura's eyes. “There are worse things here than a pissy businessman. How do you think Obito got those scars in the first place?”

“What?” Sakura asks, and this turn of conversation isn't one she expected in the least. “You know what happened to him?”

The bell over the diner’s door jangles, and Sakura looks automatically, turning and stepping back. Half a beat too late she realizes, wrenches back around, but it’s too late. Shisui is gone, and in the fading light she can't even see his silhouette on the street. There's no trace of him.

“Sheriff?” Tenten asks, leaning out. She’s smiling but there's something sharp in her face as well. Something wary enough that it makes Sakura think of her own reaction to Shisui, which is interesting. “Is everything all right?”

“I think so,” Sakura says, glancing back at where Shisui was with a frown. “Do you know Shisui Uchiha?”

“Sure, everyone knows Shisui,” Tenten says, and that’s a pretty smile for all it’s full of teeth. “He’s got a piece of land down by the lighthouse, and a workshop there. He’s an artist, makes jewelry and driftwood furniture. Sai sells some of his pieces at Ink.”

If Shisui is just an artist, Sakura will eat her left boot. “It sounds like there’s a bit of tension between him and Fugaku,” she says, testing.

Tenten meets her eyes, then takes a step out of the diner, letting the door fall shut behind her. “Shisui's only half Uchiha,” she says. “Technically. And his father Kagami left the family a while ago. They didn’t approve of him marrying the mayor’s brother.”

Somehow, Sakura isn't overly surprised to find another thing the Uchiha don’t approve of. She groans, manages to shift her takeout enough to rub a hand over her eyes, and sighs when Tenten laughs at her. “Please don’t do that, this day has been _terrible_.”

“Sorry, Sheriff.” Gentle hands catch the bags, resettling them so they're not in danger of falling, and when Sakura drops her hand Tenten smiles at her. “Why don’t you go home? I heard about the murders at the Landing, and I'm sure by now you could use some sleep.”

Sleep, food, and her own clothes, not necessarily in that order, Sakura thinks, and sighs. “You’re right,” she says. “Thanks.”

Tenten winks at her, sweet and cheerful. “I'm always right,” she says, beaming. “Especially about this kind of thing. You look like you're coming off a long day, and expecting tomorrow to be just as long.”

Tomorrow. Sakura doesn’t even want to think about it. She needs to go check the base of the cliffs, or the beach around them; it’s still a little hard to believe that Obito and Fugaku would have survived that fall. “Do you know if there are any paths to the base of the cliffs?” she asks. “The ones by the mouth of the Nakano.”

“Sure!” Tenten says brightly. “There’s a way down from my place, actually. Do you want me to show you in the morning? It’s not safe after dark.”

Brilliant. Sakura lets out a breath of relief and smiles back. “That would be great, thank you. Where should I meet you?”

Tenten tips her head, considering, and glances at Sakura's jeep. “You should be able to make it all the way up there,” she says. “Just take the road past the shipping yard and follow it until you cross the first bridge over the river. My driveway’s on the right. It’s pretty steep, but the road’s mostly dry. Around eight-thirty?”

“Perfect.” Sakura nods, steps back. “Thanks, Tenten.”

Tenten gives her a cheery salute. “My pleasure, Sheriff!” she says, and then ducks back into the diner.

For a moment, Sakura stays where she is, takeout bags still balanced in her arms. Then, with a groan, she heads for her jeep, entirely done with this day. As if to agree, thunder rumbles over her head, and she grimaces.

For a moment, the swift slide of the clouds across the darkening sky reveals the moon, a few days from full. The first few drops of rain splatter pavement suddenly sheened with silver, and Sakura thinks she catches a flicker of movement out of the corner of her eye. She spins, looking up the street towards the harbor, braced for another surprise, but—

There's nothing. Just shadows fading out as the moon slides behind the clouds again, and Sakura breathes out.

“I'm going _home_ ,” she says to the world at large. “No more bullshit tonight. _Please_.”

It’s possible the please takes away some of the impact, but Sakura is too tired to even start to care.

 

 

“Have you unpacked _anything_ yet?” Ino asks, amused.

Sakura rolls her eyes, even though she’s focused on refilling the tea kettle with water and Ino can only see her back. “I spent all day in the office yesterday,” she says. “And this morning I woke up to two homicides. I haven’t had the time.”

Ino laughs, tugging her oversized sweater up a little higher around her shoulders, and Sakura carefully isn't looking at her, at the curve of her bare shoulders where the worn fabric drifts sideways or the fall of her damp golden hair. She isn't thinking about how Ino now smells like her favorite rose soap, either.

“Most people would have taken the first day to unpack and get settled in,” she says, and it’s only partly teasing.

“The first thing I learned about my new job was that my predecessor _disappeared_ ,” Sakura says, a little cranky, but when she turns to pull two mugs out of the box on the counter Ino is smiling at her. It’s hard to stay annoyed in the face of that. “And that some tetchy jerk was threatening a local. Forgive me for wanting to get caught up.”

Ino's smile slides into something bittersweet at the mention of Obito, and she glances down at her hands, twisted in her lap. “I can see how that was alarming,” she agrees.

Sakura still remembers the flicker in Ino's face when Obito leaned over the counter in the diner, but—she’s clearly fond of him. She _likes_ him, judging by her tone in the station. And given everything with Fugaku, Sakura is maybe a little more open to thinking Obito isn't outright the villain here. Probably still a murderer, but—

_Please. If you find Obito, get him out of town._

Shisui looked so set, so certain. So convinced that there’s something far more dangerous to Obito in Konoha. Sakura doesn’t like that at all.

“I made up the guest bedroom,” she says, turning on the stove. “There should be enough blankets, but if you get cold I’ve got a spare in my car, too. Just let me know.”

“Thanks.” Ino smiles at her, leaning back against the cupboards and closing her eyes. “Will I have to stay here tomorrow?”

Sakura hesitates, but as tempting as it is to keep Ino somewhere secluded, the cabin is on her land, and it’s probably fairly well-known where Sakura is staying. For a moment all Sakura can think of is coming back after a long day to find the cabin ransacked, Ino missing, and she has to swallow before she can say, “No, I’ll take you in to the station. You can stay there or in Rin's lab. I don’t want you alone.”

Thankfully, unlike some people Sakura's had under protective custody, Ino doesn’t protest. She simply nods, then tugs her sleeves down to cover her fingers and glances out the rain-lashed window. “Is it all right if I ask Shikamaru to bring me some of my clothes and things while I'm there?”

“Of course.” Sakura tries for a reassuring smile. “You're not a prisoner, Ino, I swear. I just don’t want you getting hurt.”

Too honest, again. The _I_ is less _I as sheriff of Konoha_ and more _I as Sakura Haruno, who thinks you're beautiful and sweet and funny_.

It makes Ino's expression soften, though, and she slides off the counter, landing lightly. Takes two steps, until Sakura can smell rose and citrus, and then leans in. Her long hair brushes Sakura's arm, her collarbone, and she sucks in a breath, thoughts going absolutely blank as soft lips touch her cheek and linger for just a moment.

“Thank you, Sakura,” Ino says, pulling back a little, and at this distance her eyes are blue blue _blue_ , pretty enough to make Sakura's heart turn over sideways in her chest. She’s smiling, and Sakura's throat is tight, making it hard to breathe. “I'm really glad you came to Konoha.”

Then, without another word, Ino steps back, turns. She vanishes down the hall, and the door to the guest bedroom clicks shut in her wake.

Sakura stays where she is, practically frozen. Her heart is beating too hard, and her chest feels full and hot. The sound of her name in Ino's voice rings in her ears, and with a low groan she presses her hands over her face to hide her burning cheeks.

“God,” she says out loud, and part of it is _I'm not going to survive this_ , but…

The other part is definitely _she’s so pretty, somebody help me_ , and Sakura probably has her priorities irreversibly skewed, but right now that seems like the far more distressing part.

 

 

Loud pounding on the door wakes Sakura from restless dreams of cliffs and dark water, circling crows and the current pulling her under. She surfaces from sleep with a strangled gasp, one fist already rising, and lies there for a moment, trying to catch her breath through the unease. Swallows, and sits up, raking her hair out of her face as she grabs for her phone. It’s just barely seven, still dark, and she can hear the sound of the storm still raging outside.

The pounding comes again, too loud and close to be thunder, and Sakura staggers out of bed, doesn’t even pause to pull on her pants as she breaks into a jog. The light on the front steps is on, but she doesn’t wait to check who it is, that same sense of urgent fear from her dream riding her, and she drags the door open with a brusque, “What’s wrong?”

“What’s _wrong_ ,” Temari says, half-soaked, her hair falling out of its tails, “is that you moved to the middle of _nowhere_ and I had to drive seven hours to get here, only to find out there's no motel, not even a _hostel_.”

Sakura stare at her blankly for a beat, brain still trying to catch up, and then groans and digs the heels of her palms into her eyes. “Temari,” she says. “God damn it.”

“Don’t take that tone with _me_ , cherry pie,” Temari says sweetly. “You're the one who called me for help.”

“Texted. I _texted_ you _one question_ ,” Sakura protests. “In no way, shape, or form did I _ever_ ask you for help on this.”

“Not _yet_ ,” Temari says, all killing sweetness. “And move, we’re taking your couch. Nowhere else in this damn town is available, and I'm not sleeping in the car.”

Sakura makes a face, but Temari's car is roughly the size of a matchbox and even Sakura can acknowledge that it would be just about the worst place to sleep, given the tagalongs hovering on the path behind Temari. “How did you even find me?” she demands, but she steps out of the doorway, holding it open.

“Gaara,” Temari says, like that explains everything, and hauls her duffle bag past Sakura as she marches in. “Nice panties.”

“I _vividly_ remember why we broke up,” Sakura tells her, and means every word of it.

“Me too,” Temari says over her shoulder. “You're _insufferable_.”

Sakura splutters. “ _I'm_ the insufferable one?” she demands.

“Kankurō told me that conflict in a relationship can come from the partners being too similar,” Gaara says flatly, and pauses to nod to Sakura as he follows his sister. “Thank you for inviting us, Sakura.”

Sakura doesn’t bother reminding him that there was no invitation, just sighs and offers him a strained smile. “Hi, Gaara. And I don’t think you should be taking any sort of romantic advice from Kankurō, okay?”

“Hey!” Kankurō protests, weighted down with three extra bags and looking displeased about it. “I'm his brother, I'm a _font_ of good advice.”

“Not when you haven’t managed more than a one-off in three years,” Temari calls back.

Over Kankurō’s complaints, Sakura smiles at Gaara, a little more genuinely this time, and asks, “How’s the…possession thing?”

Gaara blinks at her, pale eyes eerie in the half-light, and for a moment something dark seems to stir under his skin. “Shukaku is behaving,” he says. “We destroyed a colony of vampires a week ago, so he is glutted on their blood.”

Right. That’s…creepy.  _Really_ creepy.  Sakura really wishes she hadn’t asked, but at least she knows now. “Good. Just—try to keep the glutting to a minimum in Konoha, okay? Or find some wildlife, not…citizens.”

“Of course, Sakura.” Gaara nods solemnly, then heads for Temari.

“Nice job not running screaming,” Kankurō says with a smirk, turning sideways to edge through the door. “Oh, hey, not feeling the matching this morning? I get that, fashion’s hard sometimes.”

Sakura looks down at her tank top and panties, rolls her eyes, and pulls the door closed after him. “Nice to see you too, Kankurō.”

“Sheriff now, huh? That’s swanky.” Kankurō dumps two of the bags at the edge of the couch, then sets the last on the coffee table. “The rug’s pretty soft, Temari. I’ll be fine out here.”

“You’d better,” Temari says, a little distracted as she pulls a map out of one pocket of the bag, then unfolds it. “Sakura, where exactly were you when you had that bout of stupidity?”

“Which one?” Sakura asks dryly. “If you mean dating you, it was by the port, and I pulled you out of a sewer grate you’d gotten stuck in just as you were about to get eaten. If I remember correctly, your first words to me were—”

“My knight in shining armor,” Temari finishes for her, rolling her eyes. “Someday you're going to run out of mileage on that.”

“Not today,” Sakura retorts, and turns on the lights. “It was along the Nakano River, about a mile from the bay. There's a shipping yard—”

“Sakura?” a sleepy voice asks, and Sakura freezes with an inward curse. A moment later, Ino steps out of the hall, long hair tangled around her, still wearing that oversized sweater. Sakura has to swallow at the sight of her, warm and rumpled, at the memory of her smelling like Sakura's soap.

Pale blue eyes widen, and Ino's gaze flickers over Gaara, Kankurō, Temari, drifts to Sakura and catches. She pauses, color touching her cheeks, and Sakura likes looking at her a hell of a lot more than she should.

“You didn’t tell me you had _company_ ,” Temari says, sounding offended. She folds her arms across her chest, giving Sakura a look, and adds, “How long did it take me to talk you into bed? _Weeks_? And you’ve been here, what, _maybe_ a week—”

“Two days, technically,” Sakura corrects, rolling her eyes again. “And it’s not like that, shut up. This is Ino Yamanaka, she’s in protective custody.”

“In your _house_?”

“I told you I don’t have any deputies!”

Ino laughs, sweet and bright, and steps into the room, offering a wave. “Good morning,” she says. “Are you on the police force, too?”

Temari's expression is still judgmental, but she shakes her head. “I consult,” she says, which in Sakura's opinion is a very selective way of saying _I butt in on police cases when I think the culprit is something supernatural that only conspiracy theorists would believe in_. “I'm Temari, and these are my brothers, Gaara and Kankurō. We came to help Sakura with the case.”

Sakura rubs her eyes. She hasn’t had nearly enough sleep to deal with this. “I have to meet someone in an hour and a half, and I have to get Ino to the station first,” she says. “Our crime scene tech is armed, but she’s my only help. You're going to have to entertain yourself, Temari. I'm busy.”

Kankurō waves a lazy hand. “Gaara and I can watch her,” he says, and flashes Ino a smile. “We usually get these kinds of jobs, so we’re good at it, pinky swear.”

That’s…actually a good solution. It keeps Ino out of sight, or at least more so than sitting in the station, and despite appearances Kankurō is good at playing bodyguard. Sakura hesitates, then glances over at Ino.

“Would you mind?” she asks. “Kankurō’s reliable, and if Fugaku tries anything you’re at least not in the middle of town this way. Tenten is going to take me down to the base of the cliffs, so I don’t think you want to come.”

Ino goes about three shades paler and shakes her head quickly. “I’ll stay here,” she agrees, and returns Kankurō’s smile. “Thanks.”

Kankurō offers her a salute. “No problem. We can all just make ourselves at home. Sakura, if you want to leave your stuff out we can start unpacking for you, too. I remember how your last place was set up.”

“Sure,” Sakura says, because if this job goes anything like her last one, this place won't see very much of her anyway. “Just leave my clothes and documents alone. Temari, you can—”

“I'm coming with you, obviously,” Temari says dryly. “Get dressed. You can show me where the attack happened after your meeting.”

“What did I _just_ say last night about butting in on my cases?” Sakura demands.

Temari just gives her an arch look. “You don’t have any deputies, just a crime scene tech. I at least know what the hell I'm doing. More than you do sometimes.”

As much as Sakura hates to admit it, Temari has a point. She’s good with the supernatural, and Sakura can't exactly ask anyone else how to take out a mer if she happens on the one in the river again. That horse from yesterday is still on her mind, too, and if they're going to be poking around the cliffs she wants to make sure it’s not an active threat.

“Fine,” she says, sighing. “ _Fine_. But I'm not paying you for this, since I didn’t _ask_ for your help.”

“That’s fine,” Temari says easily, because of course she does. Sakura is pretty sure the one good thing their father ever did for Temari, Kankurō, and Gaara was dying and leaving them his fortune.

Shaking her head in surrender, Sakura turns for her room, pausing next to Ino. “There should be enough food in the fridge for breakfast,” she says, “and Kankurō can pick up whatever you need from the store. Call me if anything happens, all right? Same rules as last night.”

“I will,” Ino promises, and curls her fingers around Sakura's wrist. “You’ll catch Fugaku, I'm sure of it.”

She’d better, Sakura thinks grimly, sliding her hand down to squeeze Ino's fingers lightly. If something happens to Ino on her watch, she’s not going to forgive herself.


	10. The wild waves whist

“Is _everything_ out here in the middle of nowhere?” Temari asks, wrinkling her nose.

Sakura rolls her eyes, slamming the door of her jeep shut with maybe a little more force than is absolutely necessary. “Small town,” she says. “And no one’s making you stay if you don’t like it, Temari.”

Temari slides out of the passenger seat, and to her credit she doesn’t even blink at landing in ankle-deep mud. “I see gratitude is just one more New Year’s resolution you abandoned,” she says dryly. “I'm here to help, Sakura, not piss you off.”

“You’ve always been good at multitasking,” Sakura retorts, but she sighs, slipping on a headband to keep her hair out of her face. There's a steady wind, cold enough to be uncomfortable, and she tries her best to sink deeper into her winter coat, casting a wary look at the sky. Cloudy, but with no immediate promise of rain, so that at least seems like a good sign. Not that there are all that many otherwise, but the trip up here was hard enough; if there's even a little rain getting back down Tenten's driveway isn't going to be feasible without a helicopter.

“Neat little place,” Temari says, assessing, and Sakura rolls her eyes where Temari can't see. The farmhouse ahead of them is huge, with a chimney curling smoke into the air and lights on in the upstairs windows. Especially big for one person, Sakura thinks, but she can only see one truck parked near the big red barn, and no signs of other vehicles.

“Tenten said she’d be around,” she says, tucking her keys into the pocket of her jeans and starting up the broad sweep of the driveway. From here, the line of trees almost blocks the view of the ocean, but if Sakura has her directions right they're in the hills above the shipping yard, even higher than the cliffs where Obito and Fugaku fell. She really hopes Tenten's path down leads to the right area, because there didn’t seem to be a lot of room for error with those rocks.

“Who is Tenten exactly?” Temari asks, tucking her hands into the pockets of her leather jacket, though she doesn’t bother zipping it up. Sakura resents that she’s still hot, even after their breakup, but Temari looks cool without ever even _trying_. Sakura's tried to mimic her before, but she always comes off as cute no matter how much black she wears or how heavy her shitkicking boots are.

“The owner,” Sakura says, tipping her chin at the farmhouse. “She works at the diner in town sometimes.”

“Blondie’s diner?” Temari asks, making a judgmental face.

“I don’t think you have the right to call anyone blondie,” Sakura retorts, and Temari huffs. Before she can respond, though, there's a clatter like metal on stone in a quick rhythm, then the crunch of steps on gravel. Sakura tenses, hands curling into fists, but a moment later a large shape rounds the corner of the house.

It’s a horse, Sakura realizes belatedly, and drops her fist. _Three_ horses, actually, one white, one steel-grey, and one a bright brown. Tenten is perched on the back of the one in the middle, without a saddle or a bridle, hanging onto the leads of the grey and brown ones. When she sees them, she grins, lifting one hand slightly.

“Morning, Sheriff,” she calls. “One second, sorry!”

“No problem,” Sakura says, bemused, and watches the white horse turn from Tenten's leg, avoiding them neatly as it heads for the barn. The brown one snorts and shies from her and Temari, but Tenten keeps her hold on it with the ease of practice, urging it to follow. Sakura's entire breadth of knowledge about horses comes from a brief childhood obsession with unicorns and a few glimpses of carriage horses in her old city, but these ones seem _big_ , with thick legs and broad bodies. She keeps a wary distance, stepping back as they pass, and watches cautiously as Tenten rides straight into the barn, then drops one of the ropes. The grey keeps moving, right into an open stall, and Tenten slides off the white one’s back, then leads the brown into another. The white horse stands placidly, ears pricked, until Tenten clucks as she shuts the brown into a stall. Then it turns, steps into another empty pen, and immediately starts nosing at a hay net.

Tenten swings the last door shut, slides the bolt across, and then turns to smile at Sakura and Temari. “Sorry about that,” she says, dusting her hands off on her jeans and then pushing up the sleeves of her plaid shirt. Her hair is coming out of its buns, and her cheeks are flushed red with the cold and the exertion. She is, Sakura reflects, _absolutely_ part of Konoha's plague of pretty people. “Let me just get their grain and I’ll show you to the cliffs. They were further down the mountain than I thought they’d be, so I'm a little behind.”

“It’s no problem,” Sakura says, returning her smile. “I'm grateful you're willing to show me the way down.”

Tenten laughs. “Anything for our new sheriff,” she says cheerfully, then smiles at Temari and turns, heading for the far end of the barn and vanishing into a room.

A hand like a claw closes hard around Sakura's bicep, and Temari hisses loudly, “ _Who_ is _that_? Sakura, is that _her_?”

 _Oh_ , Sakura thinks, and it’s a little too gleeful for decorum. Oh, wow, that was one reactions she was _not_ expecting but it’s entirely perfect. She casts a glance at Temari, takes in the way wide green eyes are locked on the place where Tenten disappeared, and only just manages to swallow her smirk.

“Yeah, that’s Tenten,” she says nonchalantly. “Look, Temari, if you're going to have a problem with her you can always wait in the jeep.”

Temari actually _splutters_ , and this is truly the best day of Sakura's life.

Before Temari can actually form words, Tenten steps out of the room, carrying three buckets. She leaves one in each stall, and at Sakura's side Temari straightens up like there’s a wire on her spine, posture instantly perfect. By the time Tenten heads towards them with a smile, the flush high up on Temari's cheeks is the only sign of her lack of composure.

“Nice drafts,” she says, folding her arms over her chest. “Are they Percherons?”

Tenten looks surprised, but she brightens immediately. “Yes!” she says brightly. “Kunai and Shuriken are, at least. Bō is a Shire. I've got a couple more mares down in the lower barn, too—I breed workhorses. Do you ride?”

 “When I have the opportunity,” Temari says, close to casual but not quite making it all the way there. Her riding is news to Sakura, but Temari isn't the type to lie, so Sakura's willing to put it down to _stretching the truth_ rather than outright misinformation. Temari pointedly ignores Sakura's raised eyebrow, regardless, and despite her supposed interest in the horses her eyes haven’t moved from Tenten.

Tenten beams, bright and enthusiastic. “Then you’ll have to come riding with me sometime! There aren’t a lot of people who enjoy it around here.” She holds out a hand, and the look on Temari's face is the closest to deer in the headlights that Sakura has ever seen on her. “I'm Tenten! Are you a friend of the sheriff’s?”

There's a half-second hesitation, and Sakura helpfully coughs into her fist. The sound seems to jolt Temari back to awareness, because she reaches out, taking Tenten's hand, and manages, “I'm—yes. A friend. Of Temar—of _Sakura's_ , I'm Temari.”

It takes all of Sakura's considerable willpower not to laugh out loud, and the only thing that keeps her from doing so is the knowledge that Temari's vengeance is _awful_.

“Temari's a private investigator who’s helping out while she’s in town,” she says, mostly to keep herself from snickering.

“Well, I’ll definitely have to steal you away for a ride while you're here,” Tenten says cheerfully, and Sakura can see the way Temari swallows hard. Whether fortunately or unfortunately, Tenten doesn’t seem to notice; she turns to Sakura and offers, “Ready when you are, Sheriff!”

Sakura firmly stamps down her amusement, coughs to clear her throat, and answers, “Lead the way.”

Tenten gives her a cheerful salute, then heads out of the barn through a side door. There's a gravel path that leads past a fenced field, then turns in a wide loop towards the slope of the hill where it falls away. Instead of sticking to the path, Tenten leaves it halfway down, stepping into the muddy grass.

“You said you needed to get to the cliffs by the bay, right?” she says over her shoulder.

Sakura makes a sound of agreement, minding her step carefully on the slippery slope. “I need to check the rocks under the cliff just east of there,” she says.

Tenten tosses her a smile. “I should be able to get you there and back before the storm hits. We should have a few hours, but the path’s pretty slow going.”

“Storm?” Sakura asks, surprised, and takes another glance at the sky. The clouds don’t seem any heavier or more threatening than they did when the rain stopped earlier.

“Call it a hunch.” Tenten shrugs easily, and at the edge of a zigzagging wooden fence, she pauses, leaning over for a moment. “Okay, the ground will hold. Just mind your step, Sheriff, Temari. The rocks can skid sometimes.”

Right. Sakura watches her vault the fence casually, then take three hewn-earth steps down. Carefully, Sakura leans over, and—

Well. She’s not bad with heights, as a rule, but _damn_.

“Hell,” Temari mutters, and she exchanges a glance with Sakura that says she’s sharing all the same reservations. Tenten's trail is maybe a foot and a half wide, packed earth worn smooth as it cuts down the nearly-sheer face of the cliff, towards the churning sea below. They have to be a hundred feet up at _least_ , and there's no hint of a handrail to be seen. There _might_ be a beach below, depending on how generous Sakura wants to be with her definitions, but in this case the narrow strip of sand seems like it would do more harm than good when it comes to breaking a fall from the path.

Taking a breath, Sakura swallows, steels herself, and swings over the fence. Approaching the edge of the cliff seems a little like walking to her death, but she thinks of possible bodies on the beach, grits her teeth, and keeps moving.

“Okay, Sheriff?” Tenten asks, turning to look back at her, and her expression is both amused and understanding. “Don’t worry, it’s not as bad as it looks.”

The three steps down to the start of the trail are the worst, and Sakura's head swims with vertigo at the drop, but she doesn’t let herself waver. “I’ll be fine,” she says, maybe a little grimly, and sinks her fingers into the earth at the edge of the cliff. “I don’t think your trail would pass a safety inspection, though.”

Tenten laughs, turns like the drop is nothing at all to worry about, and keeps moving. “Probably not,” she agrees cheerfully. “It’s a good thing I'm the only one who uses it, then, right?”

“I’d say,” Temari mutters from behind Sakura, but she hasn’t stopped, either.

Once Sakura gets her feet on the actual trail, it does get a little easier; there’s something like a handhold cut into the stone big enough for her to curl her fingers around, and clinging to it lets her step a little more confidently as she follows Tenten. It’s harder to ignore the drop when there’s nothing between her and it, but she keeps her eyes fixed ahead of her.

“Do you come down here a lot?” she asks, largely to keep her mind off the fall and the sick churning of her stomach.

“Not that often,” Tenten says. “I like to watch the sunrise from the steps, and sometimes after a storm I’ll check the beach to see what’s washed up, but otherwise I take the road behind the shipping yard down to the bay. The horses like to swim, and they can't make it down this path.”

That’s for damned sure, Sakura thinks, breathing in. She doesn’t know if _they_ can make it down this path, honestly, but she’s willing to take Tenten's word that they can.

“You live up here alone?” Temari asks, and Sakura rolls her eyes while neither of them can see. Of course Temari won't wait until they're back on solid ground to start assessing her chances with Tenten. Well, as long as she can stop stuttering she might have chances. Sakura is reserving judgment, largely because she’s _never_ seen Temari stutter over a girl before.

“My cousin Karin owns the next property over,” Tenten answers unreservedly, and casts a smile over her shoulder. “She makes perfumes! In the summertime you can smell the flower fields from here if the wind is right. But up here it’s just me and the horses.”

It’s worth the risk of falling to her death for Sakura to turn and level a judgmental look at Temari, who pulls a face at her in return. Satisfied that her point’s been made, Sakura turns back, steps over a clump of deep green wildflowers, and squints ahead of them. There's a narrow gap where their cliff butts up against another, a deep crevice stretching back through the rock, and the sight of it makes Sakura frown. The path continues after the break, but…

Rin mentioned a cave, when she was telling Sakura about Obito's accident. He got swept into a cave and everyone thought he’d drowned. A cave near the cliffs, by the bay, and—what are the odds?

“Tenten, is this where Obito had his accident?” she asks, and the question rasps in her throat, makes her heart race because this is _something_ , a definite clue, can't be a coincidence. Her gut tells her it’s not, and Sakura trusts her instincts.

Startled, Tenten pauses, looking back at Sakura again. “Obito Uchiha?” she asks. “Yeah, it’s right below us. The cave he got pulled into is about twenty yards that way.” She points towards the bay, in the same direction they're heading. “You can't reach it unless you have a boat, though, and even that’s dangerous. There's a strong current there that no one can predict—it’s killed a few people who’ve tried to get to the cave. The whole thing is underwater except at low tide.”

That must have been a hell of an accident, Sakura thinks grimly. And maybe that’s obvious, given Obito's scars, but Sakura wasn’t quite thinking of it like this. Wasn’t considering Obito getting his friend out of the current, then getting dragged underwater, into a cavern with no escape and no air. The thought makes her grimace, because she’s had cases with drowned victims, and it’s always seemed like one of the worst ways to go, in her opinion.

A hand touches her shoulder, and she glances back at Temari, lifting a brow. Temari is frowning deeply, and green eyes are fixed on the water instead of on Tenten's ass, for once. When Sakura raises a brow, Temari glances at her, then says softly, “Mers will set up their shoals in underwater cave systems. If there's one down there, we’re fucked, Sakura. I don’t have enough firepower for a whole colony of mers out for blood, especially that close to the water.”

And there are only so many things Sakura can punch at one time. She hesitates, biting her lip, and asks, “Would mers from the ocean swim up a freshwater river, though?”

“They're not _fish_ ,” Temari scoffs, rolling her eyes. “Yeah, they wouldn’t hesitate.”

A deadly rip current that no one can predict seems like good cover for mers catching swimmers and dragging them down, Sakura thinks. “Do they actually…?”

“Eat people?” Temari says dryly, because she knows precisely where Sakura's brain is going. “Yeah. _Gleefully_ , a lot of the time. Some of them don’t, but a lot _do_.”

“Grand,” Sakura mutters, but she takes a breath and keeps moving. “We can burn that bridge when we get to it. I need to get down to the base of the cliff. It’s important.”

“I _definitely_ remember why we broke up,” Temari complains, but she doesn’t turn around.

Sakura rolls her eyes, but before she can answer Tenten calls back, “Were you two partners?”

“Yes,” Temari says.

“ _No_ ,” Sakura says in the same moment, and can _feel_ the pissy expression Temari levels at the back of her head. “We worked together a few times, but Temari's never been police.”

“I _consult_ ,” Temari insists. “And we were _domestic_ partners, cherry pie. In case you’ve forgotten.”

“With you turning up like a recurring headache, how could I forget?” Sakura mutters, and Tenten laughs as they catch up to her.

“You seem like you're still good friends,” she says, glances down at the water, and then up at the sky.

The worry that crosses her previously bright expression cuts off Sakura's protest before it can leave her tongue. “Tenten?” she asks cautiously.

“I think the storm’s coming faster,” Tenten says. “The wind changed direction.”

Sakura can't tell; it feels the same to her as it whips past the cliff, but she’s also not about to question someone more familiar with Konoha's weather patterns. “Do we still have time to get down?” she asks.

Tenten hums, judging the distance. “I think so,” she says after a moment. “We should move faster, though.”

Sakura makes a face, but when Tenten starts picking her way down with longer strides, she tries her best to keep up, gripping the cliff as tightly as she dares. Breaking the stone won't help here, not in the least.

“Are you looking for something in particular, Sheriff?” Tenten asks. “I heard about the murders at the Landing, is this the same thing?”

“I think so,” Sakura says, not quite breathless, but she’s definitely paying more attention to her footing than normal. A scuff of her boot sends pebbles showering down into the ocean below, and she has to swallow hard. “I—two of my suspects went over the cliff here. Rin thinks they survived, but I need to check.”

“Two?” Tenten asks, and she sounds surprised. “ _Two_ Uchiha?”

“How do you know _that_?” Sakura asks, a little exasperated.

Tenten offers her a sheepish smile. “Small town, Sheriff, sorry. I heard you were looking for Obito, and—the Uchiha are known for being strong swimmers.”

They’d have to be _especially_ strong swimmers to make it out of this part of the sea, Sakura thinks, glancing at the water they're approaching. Lower now, thankfully, but the cliff towering above them is a good reminder of just how far a fall it was.

“They would have washed up here if they did die,” Tenten offers, like an apology. “The current gets caught in the bay, and things don’t often get pulled out without a storm. Either here or by the lighthouse, but the bodies would turn up eventually.”

The lighthouse will have to be Sakura's next stop. She wants to talk with Shisui again anyway, so that’s fine by her. His cryptic warnings mean he knows _something_ , and Sakura wants it.

“Is that a boat?” Temari asks suddenly, sounding suspicious.

Tenten and Sakura turn, following the line of her finger out towards the mouth of the bay. Sakura has to squint through the gloom of the heavy cloud-cover, but…that definitely looks like a boat. If Tenten is right about a storm coming, though, it seems stupid to be out, needlessly reckless—

“It’s _The Rasengan_ ,” Tenten says, startled. “What’s she doing out of her dock in this weather?”

Naruto and Sasuke? Sakura would definitely peg Naruto as the reckless one, so that fits. “Should we—”

Red light washes across the sky, like a sudden sunrise turned to blood, and the wind _screams_ past them. Sakura shouts, almost torn loose of her perch, and on instinct she grabs the handhold, lashes out to catch the back of Tenten's shirt as the other woman staggers. Tenten grabs her wrist, lets Sakura haul her in and wraps an arm around her as she grabs for the ledge, and Sakura lets her steady them, flinging a hand out towards Temari as she cries out.

Her fingers just graze leather as the wind rips Temari right off the face of the cliff.

For one eternal heartbeat’s breadth, Sakura can't see anything but the surprise in Temari's face as she falls, the shock, the fear. She tumbles back through empty air, and they’re halfway down the cliff but there’s still fifty feet to fall—

“No!” Tenten cries, and she throws herself forward, right over the edge. Sakura shouts a denial, tries to grab her, but she’s too slow, _can't_ , and Tenten tumbles after Temari in a whirl of brown hair coming lose from its buns.

One second of horrified indecision is half a second too long. The cliff-face under Sakura's fingers shakes like there's an earthquake, trembles, _shifts_. She yelps as half the cliff seems to fall away beneath her grip, and she’s suddenly teetering on a narrow ledge with the fall to the sea on one side and a gaping cavern cut through the stone on the other. The howling wind almost blows her headlong into the darkness, and she shouts, grabs for the edge of the path—

It comes apart under her fingers, as fine as sand, abruptly insubstantial instead of hard-packed and worn solid, and Sakura is off-balance already. One more hard gust and she loses her grip completely, tumbles forward into the darkness with a lurch of sickening freefall. Too fast, and it could be stone below her or it could be water, but Sakura doesn’t _know_ and the wrong answer will kill her.

There's no time to worry about it. The darkness closes over her, and Sakura twists, aims feet-first towards her unseen landing spot, and _prays_.

The impact of the water jars through her bones, and the cold is like a second blow. She gasps before she can help it, inhales water, and panic surges. It’s impossible to tell which direction is up, if she’s sinking or rising, and it’s so _dark_ —

Hot, violet light splits the darkness, and it feels like fire curling through Sakura's veins, beating back the confusion, the disorientations, the pain. She swallows a choking cough, kicks out, turns over, and a hard push sends her arrowing up through the water. She surfaces with a gasp, and that same purple glow is spreading out around her, illuminating cold stone and black water, an edge of stone that juts out. Sakura grabs for it, hauls herself up, and collapses onto her hands and knees, coughing up saltwater that burns her throat. The only sound is the lapping water, the distant howl of the wind, and Sakura thinks of Tenten, of Temari, and forces herself up, staggering to her feet.

Her boots are too waterlogged to be useful, so she kicks them off, dumps her sodden jacket on top of them, and then reaches up, pressing a hand over the glowing diamond on her forehead. “Thank you,” she whispers, and something golden and green washes through her, like summer in her blood. The cold retreats, unable to withstand its force, and Sakura breathes out, takes a step forward.

There's solid stone in front of her, thick and cold, but Sakura curls her hand into a fist and tells the darkness, with all the ferocity rising in her chest, “ _You can't have me_.”

The chilling gloom shivers around her, like an animal. Breathes, a long, moaning groan like the distant wind, but Sakura can feel it right down to her bones. she bares her teeth, _snarls_ , lunges with all her strength behind her fist, and slams a punch into the stone.

It shatters instantly, explodes outward, and Sakura doesn’t pause. She throws herself out of that living darkness, catches a flash of water and turns the motion into a dive just in time. Cold, still, but not in the same way. This is survivable, where the other cold wasn’t, and Sakura surfaces, strikes out towards where Temari and Tenten would have fallen. She can't see anyone in the water, but the swells are big enough that she doesn’t trust her eyes—

A flash of silver and crimson pulls her gaze skyward, and her breath catches.

There's a dragon in the sky, long and serpentine and the color of an old nickel, shimmering with highlights of blue and gold. Its mane is blood-red, whipping in the wind, and there's a pearl gleaming in one claw, while in the other is a familiar figure.

“Temari!” Sakura cries, and her heart is in her throat.

Temari doesn’t even glance at her, probably can't hear her, definitely doesn’t see her—her eyes are locked on the dragon holding her, but there's no blood, no threat. The creature is circling, like it’s _searching_ , and Sakura thinks of Tenten, has to swallow.

“Is this your doing?” she whispers, because she doesn’t need to be louder than that.

There's no answer, but the point of heat on her forehead fades to a familiar warmth, and the violet light is gone an instant later.

“Sheriff!” a voice shouts. “Sheriff, there you are! Over here!”

Sakura turns, ducks under a swell that breaks over her head, and surfaces to the sight of a familiar fishing boat, faded orange paint with its name painted in curling letters on the hull. Naruto is leaning out over the rail, rope wrapped around his arm, and when he catches Sakura's gaze his face lights up with a relieved grin as he waves. “Sheriff!”

Sakura has never, ever been so glad to see a smuggler. She waves back, and when Naruto throws a rope over the side she swims towards it. Above them, the dragon circles, then dives, and the graceful flow of its body shortens, _shifts_. Temari yelps, and a moment later she hits the deck of the boat with a thump. Right behind her, Tenten's figure condenses out of the dragon’s brilliance, and she lands in a crouch, then falls forward onto her knees.

Wrapping the rope around her arm, Sakura lets Naruto drag her in, grabs the rope ladder hanging over the rail, and hauls herself up and out of the water. Sasuke leans over the rail above her, dark eyes sharp with something like concern, and when he sees her the breath visibly leaves him.

“You look like a drowned cat,” he says, and offers her a hand.

Sakura takes it without hesitation, clasping his wrist and letting him haul her up and over the edge of the boat. “Better than a dead cat,” she counters, and Sasuke snorts, one corner of his mouth tipping up.

With a laugh, Tenten sits back, brushing her long hair behind her ears. She’s shaking, just a little, and her eyes are glowing a bright, unearthly bronze. “You made it,” she says with relief.

Tenten was the dragon, Sakura thinks, and—

“Oh, thank god,” she says, and stumbles over, grabbing her. The only image in her head is Tenten leaping out into nothingness to save Temari, and she lets out a shuddering breath, dragging Tenten into a tight hug. “I thought you were _dead_.”


End file.
